Put lemon juice, about 250 ml water and sugar in a pot. Cut open the vanilla pod and scrape out the pulp. Add vanilla pulp and pod and cinnamon sticks. Peel apples, quarter them, remove seeds and cut them into slices and put them into the pot. Bring to the boil and steam in a closed pot for 12-15 minutes until the apple slices fall apart. In the meantime, peel and wash the potatoes and grate them finely. Peel onion and grate it to the potatoes.
Stir the egg into the potato dough and season with salt. Heat 1 tablespoon of clarified butter in a pan. Add about 1 tablespoon of batter per buffer to the pan and shape into flat, palm-sized flat cakes with a skimmer. After about 4 minutes turn and fry for another few minutes. Remove the buffers from the pan and let them drip off on kitchen paper. Repeat the process until the dough is processed. Serve with apple compote, sugar and chives if desired