Nigel Slater’s midweek treat: poached apples, maple syrup

Serves 3-4. Ready in 40 minutes.

Squeeze the juice from 3 lemons – you should get about 125ml. Pour this into a baking dish.

Peel 6-8 small apples (the smallest you can find) and drop them into the lemon juice as you go, to prevent them browning.

Pour in 100ml of maple syrup, then add 5 cloves, 1 short cinnamon stick and 1 vanilla pod, split in half lengthways.

Heat the oven to 180c/gas mark 4.

Bake the apples for about 50 minutes, testing them regularly for tenderness with a metal skewer. The apples should be soft all the way through.

Sometimes I like to add a crisp element to this recipe in the form of a sweet and salty brown sugar crumble to scatter over the fruit.

Beat together 100g of demerara sugar and 100g of butter and 1 tsp of sea salt flakes. Mix in 75g of jumbo oats and the same of plain flour. Crumble the mixture into small nuggets of different sizes on to a parchment-lined baking tray, then bake in the preheated oven for 20 minutes until pale-biscuit coloured.

Let the crumbs cool on the rack, then transfer to a bowl. They will keep for a few days in an airtight container.

• Poached apples are best prepared with small, whole apples. Should they be on the large side, slice them in half and scoop out the cores with a teaspoon.

• Check regularly for tenderness. The apples should be quite soft but still in one piece. Some varieties will fluff up and collapse if cooked for too long (although they will still be nice to eat).

Photograph by Jonathan Lovekin