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Flourless oatmeal apple cake topped with a fan of glazed apple slices, one slice cut to show the oat crumb with walnuts and cranberries

Flourless Oatmeal Apple Cake

A flourless oatmeal apple cake made with soaked rolled oats, cottage cheese and honey, topped with a fan of glazed apple slices. No flour, no refined sugar, and a crumb that stays moist for days.
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Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 40 minutes
Cooling Time 20 minutes
Total Time 1 hour 20 minutes
Servings: 8 slices
Course: Breakfast
Cuisine: American
Calories: 210
Ingredients Method Notes

Ingredients
  

For the soaked oats
  • 1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
  • 100 ml warm water
For the batter
  • 2 large eggs
  • 100 g cottage cheese
  • 2 tablespoons plain yogurt
  • 2 tablespoons honey
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1 large apple peeled and coarsely grated about 150 g
  • 60 g walnuts roughly chopped
  • 60 g dried cranberries
For the top
  • 1 medium apple peel on sliced 2 mm thick
  • 1 tablespoon honey warmed
  • 2 tablespoons sliced almonds
  • 1 teaspoon butter for the pan

Method
 

  1. Put the rolled oats in a bowl and pour over the warm water. Stir once and leave them for 10 minutes while you prepare the pan and the apples. They are ready when no loose water pools at the bottom of the bowl when you tilt it.
  2. Butter an 8-inch (20 cm) springform pan and line the base with parchment. Peel and coarsely grate the large apple. Slice the second apple, peel on, about 2 mm thick. Heat the oven to 350F (180C).
  3. Blend the eggs, cottage cheese, yogurt, honey and vanilla for about 30 seconds, until completely smooth with no visible curds. The mixture should pour like thin pancake batter.
  4. Tip the soaked oats into a large bowl, pour over the blended base, then add the baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Fold in the grated apple, walnuts and cranberries. The batter should mound on a spoon and fall off slowly rather than pour.
  5. Scrape the batter into the pan and level the top. Lay the apple slices in overlapping circles from the outside in, pressing each one lightly so it sits half-sunk in the surface. Scatter over the sliced almonds.
  6. Bake on the middle shelf for 40 minutes. If the apples are browning hard before 30 minutes, lay a sheet of foil loosely over the top. The cake is done when the centre springs back under a finger and a skewer comes out with a few moist crumbs but no wet batter.
  7. Warm the remaining tablespoon of honey until it runs and brush it over the apples while the cake is still hot. Leave the cake in the pan for 20 minutes before releasing the ring, then cool completely before slicing.

Notes

Storage: covered at room temperature the cake keeps for 3 days and refrigerated for 5. It improves overnight as the oats finish softening. Freeze whole or in slices, wrapped tight, up to 3 months.
Make ahead: soak the oats and blend the wet base separately the night before, and keep both covered in the fridge. Do not combine them with the baking powder until you are ready to bake.
Substitutions: cottage cheese can be replaced by the same weight of ricotta or quark. Maple syrup works in place of honey in the same quantity, though the glaze will be less glossy.
Oats: use old-fashioned rolled oats. Quick oats need only 5 minutes of soaking; steel-cut oats will not soften in time and should not be substituted.
On the sweetener: honey is still sugar, and most dried cranberries are sweetened. This cake has no refined sugar, which is not the same as having no sugar.
Nutrition is an estimate calculated from standard ingredient values, not a laboratory analysis. It will vary with the size of your apples and the brand of dried fruit.