Hello readers of David’s Newsletter! I’m thrilled to be here filling in for David while he’s traveling! You may not know me, but I am a friend of David’s and a fellow Substack writer. My newsletter is called Susanality. David and I have a few things in common.
One, we are both kind of OG (i.e., old). We’ve both been doing what we do for quite a long time. Like David, I started out in restaurants and foodservice, including the pastry kitchen. After that, I transitioned into a career in traditional media, as the food editor (I actually had a fancier title than that, but basically I ran the test kitchen and food department) of Martha Stewart Living magazine from the day it launched in 1991 until 2003. That’s 12 years. The same length of time we all go to school, and what an education it was!
I will never forget the day David called me himself to tell me about his new (first) cookbook, Room for Dessert, back in 1999, when people still made phone calls, and I had a Rolodex on my desk. I remember chatting with him for a while and probably told him that the magazine didn’t really cover books. All of the content was kind of self-generated, so I always felt bad telling people like David that we couldn’t really cover them. It was memorable because for all the books that came across my desk, I think David was the first author to call me, and I’m sure he was funny too.
Many years later, when I was visiting Paris, I got in touch with David to see if he’d like to meet me for coffee. I should have realized that everyone got in touch with David to meet for coffee, but I’m glad he made an exception and said yes! We met in a little cafe close to his apartment and had a very nice chat.
A few years ago, when I was accompanying Zoë François on a pastry crawl around NYC, we ended up picking Claudia Fleming up along the way and then meeting up with David at Frenchette Bakery. I really don’t remember how that all came together, but I’m glad it did, and it was the best kaffeeklatsch in the arcade of an old office building ever, especially when Lee Hanson and Riad Nasr, the chefs and proprietors, along with their pastry chef Michelle Palazzo, joined us.
Anyway, I’m glad to say David and I are friends now, and I bug him endlessly for recommendations whenever I am coming to France, and he always happily obliges. When people ask me for my Paris recommendations, I always point them to his roundups. I’m going there in a few weeks, and our WhatsApp chat is overflowing with links, many of which I am using.
Two summers ago, my husband, Steve, and I went to Paris right before the Olympics, but we wanted to take a side trip. We had never been to Brittany, but it seemed like a good place to explore, though at the time I didn’t realize how big and spread out it was. Cool and cloudy sounded great in July. Of course I asked David for any recommendations, and he gave me one that was once removed, in that he had not personally been to Ferme du Vent (the farm of the wind), but his friends had, and they said it was “magic.” That was all I needed to hear, and I immediately booked our reservation. It was near Cancale but not in Cancale, which can be a bit touristy, so the location was perfect for us. I wrote about it at the time in my newsletter if you want all the details.
One of the things I featured was a pair of delicious pastries from Grain de Vanille, the pastry shop in Cancale owned by the Roellinger family. One was the platonic ideal of the kouign amann, which is the pastry Brittany is most famous for; the other was a somewhat untraditional version of gâteau breton that was topped with crunchy toasted buckwheat and had a layer of stewed rhubarb in the center. I’ve been using toasted buckwheat in my cooking and baking for a few years now, so I really felt like I had found my people when I saw how popular it was there. We even had it on top of oysters on our first night. Later I found out that it was a special spice blend sold at Épices Roellinger, which is a twist on Japanese gomasio but made with buckwheat groats instead of the traditional sesame seeds. You can bet I brought some of that home with me — it’s good on just about everything.
Anyway, back to the cake. When David invited me to fill in for him today, I decided to reverse engineer that delicious, buttery cake that’s been lingering in my memory but with an apple filling for fall. I hate to brag, but I think I nailed it. The cake was exactly what I was going for. I decided to use some buckwheat flour in the cake batter too, along with that irresistible crunchy topping and a filling of caramelized apples in the center. It’s everything I want an apple cake to be, including easy to make. It’s the sort of cake you can leave on the counter for a couple of days, slicing off a bit whenever you have the urge. It will keep even longer in the fridge and freezes just fine too, if it lasts that long!
Can we have a second date? I would love to see you again over on Susanality, and I am having the biggest subscription sale I’ve ever had to celebrate this collaboration. All new yearly subscriptions for the paid version of my newsletter will be 25% off. This discount will be forever! If you subscribe now, renewals will be locked in at that price for as long as you continue to subscribe.
Apple Gâteau Breton
Serves 8
Whole buckwheat groats are sold raw and untoasted in the U.S. Except for bulk bins, I always find them in the tiny kosher section of the supermarket where it’s sold as kasha, by Wolff’s. They recently switched from boxes to bags, and it comes in three granulations. You want the whole granulation. You toast the groats just as you would nuts. You can pop them in the oven along with the cake for 8 to 10 minutes, shaking once or twice, until a shade darker. Here, I toasted the groats in a pan in some butter to more closely approximate what I had in Cancale.
Of course, this cake was originally created to showcase the incredible salted butter you find in Brittany, but if unsalted butter is all you have, just add the flaky sea salt in the recipe; if you have salted butter, then omit the sea salt.
For the apples:
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
4 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored, and cut into ½-inch (2cm) cubes
¼ cup (50g) granulated sugar
For the cake:
½ cup (70g) buckwheat flour
1¾ cups (225g) all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
¾ teaspoon flaky sea salt
1 cup (226g) unsalted butter, softened, plus more for the pan
1 cup (200g) granulated sugar
5 large egg yolks
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 tablespoon brandy
To finish:
2 teaspoons unsalted butter
⅓ cup (60g) whole buckwheat groats (kasha), to be toasted (see headnote)
½ cup (145g) apricot preserves
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C.) Make the apples: Heat a medium (10-inch, 25cm) skillet over medium-high heat. Add the butter, apples, and sugar and stir well until the apples are well coated. Cook, stirring or tossing occasionally, for 10 to 12 minutes, or until soft and caramelized on all sides. If the apples start browning too much, reduce the heat to medium. Set aside on a plate to cool while you make the batter.
Make the cake: In a medium bowl, combine the buckwheat flour, all-purpose flour, baking powder, and sea salt. Whisk to combine thoroughly. Set aside.
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle, cream the butter and sugar for 2 to 3 minutes, or until pale and fluffy, scraping once or twice. Add the egg yolks, one at a time, beating well after each addition and scraping as needed. Add the vanilla and brandy and beat again until mixed.
With the mixer off, add the dry ingredients, then mix on low until the flour is moistened. Turn up to medium and beat until well mixed.
Butter a 9-inch (23cm) springform pan. Spread half the batter in the bottom of the pan, using a small offset spatula to smooth it. Add the apples in an even layer. Add the remaining batter and use damp hands to spread it out over the apples. Do a final smoothing with the spatula, but it’s ok if it’s a little lumpy.
Place on a rimmed baking sheet lined with parchment and bake for 45 to 50 minutes, or until the cake is golden brown on top and feels firm in the center. Let cool on a wire rack for about 15 minutes before removing the ring.
Finish the cake: Melt the butter in a small skillet and add the buckwheat groats. Cook, stirring, over medium-high heat for 5 to 7 minutes, or until a shade darker. Transfer to a small plate to cool.
Warm the apricot preserves in a small pan or the microwave until loose. Push it through a small sieve. Discard the solids. Spread the strained preserves evenly over the top of the cake and sprinkle with the buckwheat groats. Let cool completely, or enjoy it slightly warm.
I’m a fan of buckwheat, and that cake looks wonderful! You can find already-toasted buckwheat groats in the tea section of Japanese grocers, where it’s called soba cha.
Love the recipe. I’ll leave it at that.