Maple Spiced Apple Compote

As we head towards September it's the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. The leaves are turning, the nights are drawing in and the hedgerows are laden with berries. I absolutely adore Autumn fruits and I'm always excited to see the apples ripening on my miniature tree in the garden. I'm afraid I've no idea what variety they are but they are eaters rather than cookers and taste just great! Home grown produce always tastes better. I've used the first of my pickings to create a fantastic Maple Spiced Apple Compote which is the perfect topper for a the selection of breakfast bakery goods sent to me by Genius, one of the UK’s best-known suppliers of gluten free products.

Our morning goods hamper contained four different Genius products

Sliced Spicy Fruit Loaf - Available in Sainsbury’s, Morrisons and Waitrose, RRP: £2.50
Blueberry Muffins - Available in Tesco, RRP: £2.00
Crumpets - Available in Sainsbury’s, Asda and Waitrose, RRP: £2.00
Pancakes - Available in Sainsbury’s, Asda and Waitrose, RRP: £2.00

As a family we are fortunate not to have any food allergies or intolerances however I'm all too aware of the issues faced by those who have to cope with coeliac disease and how limited their choices have been in terms of bakery products. Genius was founded by professionally trained chef, Lucinda Bruce-Gardyne, who developed the range after failing to find good quality gluten-free and wheat-free bread suitable for her gluten intolerant son. Genius Gluten Free is now the number one gluten-free bakery brand in Britain.

I blind taste tested the Genius range on my family and all of the goodies were happily eaten. However they did report that the texture was a bit different to normal but not unpleasant. Warming or toasting the products definitely helped but to be honest that's probably the same with pretty much all breakfast bakes. The sliced fruit loaf had quite an open and holey texture and the further into the loaf I went the more holes there were. I found it rather dry to eat fresh but it made good toast and french bread and had a lovely flavour of combination of sultanas, currants, raisins and spices. We're really not big crumpet eaters so probably not best suited to make judgement on them however Foodie Girl is a huge pancake fan and ate two toasted with butter and jam without any complaints. The list of ingredients for the products is long as finding a way to create a gluten alternative clearly requires some complex chemistry. As someone who has no issues eating gluten that would put me off as I really had no idea what many of the unpronounceable ingredients are. However I do appreciate that for coeliacs they literally are a lifesaver.

My apple compote was so good when served on top of the toasted muffins, pancakes and the fruit bread french toast. It would also work really well at breakfast time with porridge, as an apple sauce alternative with roast pork or as a desert topping on rice pudding or ice cream. Do make sure you use pure maple syrup and not maple flavoured syrup for this recipe. The difference is like night and day. We drizzled over extra maple syrup and added toasted chopped hazelnuts when it came to our gluten free pancake stack. Now that's Genius!