Hi Tickle, the recipe is actually 2 separate ones that I amalgamated because I was using fresh yeast and doing it by hand, whereas the 'true' recipe uses dried yeast and a breadmaker's white dough cycle. So some measurements are metric and some are cups, soz if that's confusing.
Seems to have worked, though!
Here goes:
With fresh yeast:
For the sponge:
5g fresh yeast
130g water at about 20c
150g strong white bread flour
For the dough:
1 egg
0.75 tsp salt
33g sugar
1.5 cups strong white bread flour
0.25 cup (0.5 stick) butter
Filling:
1 eating apple
1 tsp plain flour
1 tbsp sugar
0.5 tspn cinammon
0.5 tspn lemon juice
Handful of raspberries (I used frozen ones)
Custard made in m/wave with 2 tbsp Birds Custard powder, 1 tbsp sugar and half a pint of milk (to make it thick & spreadable).
Make the sponge overnight:
Dissolve the yeast in some of the water and add it to the flour with the rest of the water. Mix until all the ingredients are thoroughly combined. There is no need to knead the sponge, since time will develop the gluten sufficiently. Put the sponge in a bowl large enough to allow it to expand to at least three times its original size. Cover with a lid or polythene bag and leave it at room temperature for 12-18 hours.
Next morning:
Add the eggs, salt, sugar, and half of the flour to the sponge. Beat until smooth (I used a hand mixer with dough hooks). Then add the butter in small chunks and beat well. Add the remaining flour a handful at a time and mix in until a soft but kneadable dough is achieved and the butter thoroughly incorporated.
Knead the dough by hand or with a mixer until it is smooth and satiny, about 5 minutes.
Place the dough in a greased bowl, cover with oiled cling film, and let rise at warm room temperature until doubled in size, 1 1/2 to 2 hours.
Make the filling while waiting. Chop the apples into dice, mix with the other ingredients and set aside while making the custard (I blended the sugar and powder with a bit of cold milk, then bunged it in the microwave for 3 mins on high. Came out perfectly!). Set the custard aside to cool, then mix with the rest of the filling into a lumpy goo.
When your dough is ready, roll it out on a floured board (the dough is v. sticky so you will need a fair amount of flour!) into an oblong, then put it on an oiled baking sheet. Mark the dough (without cutting) into thirds going from top to bottom (short end at the top). Put the filling along the middle third, then cut the dough on either side at angles into 1 inch thick tabs from top to bottom. kind of like this:
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Fold alternate side tabs down across the middle of the 'loaf', creating a braid/plait effect. Brush with milk/egg wash, cover and leave in a warm place for half an hour to rise again. It won't rise much, but is worth doing.
Preheat the oven to its hottest setting. When ready, bung the plait into the oven and cook for 10 mins at high temp. Then lower the heat to 180ish and cook for another 15 mins. It should be nicely browned by now. Leave to cool and either slather with thick water icing like I did in the pic, or try and be healthy and devour it hot!
If you want the dried yeast/breadmaker version I will post it up in a separate post!