This Irish apple cake is so good, my mother would only make it in September, and it had nothing to do with the calendar. The old County Mayo recipe for Irish apple cake, from a farmhouse kitchen outside Ballycroy.

The smell of it came out the door before the cake did. Apples gone soft under a crust, a clove or two, and butter catching brown at the edge of the tin.

In this one I'll show you the whole cake from the tree to the table. Why the windfalls in the wet grass were the ones my mother wanted, and the thing she believed about them that wasn't true. The pinch of salt that keeps your apple slices from going brown. The mistake nearly everyone makes with the sugar that leaves the bottom crust soggy. What to use if you can't get Bramleys. And how she kept apples in the loft from October to Christmas.

And the September of 1961, when a storm took every apple off our tree in one night, and my mother baked seven cakes in a day.

What you'll need:
225g (8oz, 1¾ cups) self-raising flour
110g (4oz, 1 stick) cold butter
110g (4oz, ½ cup) sugar, plus extra for the top
1 egg and about 4 tablespoons of milk
2 large Bramley apples, or 3 Granny Smiths
3 cloves
180°C / 350°F for 40 to 45 minutes

Tell me in the comments: what's the one thing your family only ever made at one time of year? And when was it?

Nana Bridie's Kitchen. Old Irish kitchen wisdom from a County Mayo farmhouse, written down before it goes.

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