Growing up, a German lady in town would make baked goods and tell stories about living in Germany, both before and during WWII. (She was in her 20s working as a government clerk, and she & her officemates used Obstructive Bureaucracy & Terrible Clerking as their weapons against an increasingly awful government, but eventually that wasn't enough. She joined a resistance group, learned how to fly crop dusters, and flew refugees out under the cover of night until the war was over.) After the war, she missed flying, and became an airline stewardess. She married a GI she met on a flight, eventually settling in my hometown.
I have been searching for the kinds of things she used to bake us, often having to translate German recipes so that they aren't as Americanized (i.e. loaded with sugar). I was so excited to see that some of the recipes she used to bake are in Jürgen's cookbook, and having watched his season on Great British Bake-Off I knew that preferred to keep things tasting like what he grew up with.
The apfelkuchen is excellent! I want to tweak it a bit (I think she added ginger) but it's like I remember: a cardamom crumb that isn't overly sweet, a crisp crust, and delicious cinnamon apples.
I did take some liberties to make it closer to what I remembered: apple slices laid on top instead of the big vertical chunks the book shows, about half granulated sugar (instead of all powdered sugar), and about half whole wheat (instead of all-purpose, "for nutrition," as she used to say). I baked them in my mini pie pan as well, since I didn't have the 9" springform pan called for. (The batter amount was right and it took about 15 minutes less to bake.)
