apple cake

“Apologies for the delay” is a whole mood of 2020 and it applies to oh honey honey equally, since it has been over five months since I even visited this page.

With the ongoing pandemic and a necessary focus on the Black Lives Matter movement, it has felt strange and disconnected to be in this sugary space. I have the opportunity to focus on supporting mental health around both these topics in my actual job and I’m mindful of the immense amount of privilege I have to be able to work from home, bake as a coping skill, and be in a bubble with my close family.

All that is to say that writing about apple cake is in no way saying we are back to normal, though I am hopeful maybe someone takes this recipe and bakes it for someone who needs it.

This cake is pure comfort. It’s seasonal, it feeds a crowd, and it’s good for days on end. Each year my cousin and I go apple picking, with a heavy focus on avoiding crowds (not specific to the pandemic) and over-purchasing cider doughnuts (also, not specific to the pandemic). This cake is always on my mind in that process and I’m overly selective about the mix of apples I use because that’s just the way my personality shaped itself 32 years ago.

I first made this cake in college and it has been an annual occurrence ever since. The cake is fantastic on day one and heavenly each day after. The cinnamon apples infuse moisture into the cake, making it almost like a british-pudding-cakey-custardy-texture. I am not afraid of the word moist but I am afraid of a dry cake.

No space for dry cake in 2020.

Because it ages so well and doesn’t dry out, it’s a great one to slice and wrap up and deliver to people you like but maybe can’t be in the same room with these days.

It’s a breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner, and dessert cake – though I’m hard pressed to find a cake I don’t define in that way.

apple cake

(recipe from smitten kitchen, surprising no one)

apples
6 medium apples, diced
1 tablespoon cinnamon
5 tablespoons (65 grams) white sugar

cake
2 3/4 cups (360 grams) flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup (235 ml) oil (vegetable, mild olive, etc.)
2 cups (400 grams) white sugar
1/4 cup (60 ml) orange juice
2 1/2 (13 ml) teaspoons vanilla extract
4 large eggs

directions

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and grease and flour a bundt pan. Combine your apples with the cinnamon and sugar and let sit so that they get delicious and syrupy while you make the cake batter.

In a large bowl, whisk together your flour, baking powder, and salt. In a medium bowl, whisk together your oil, sugar, orange, juice, vanilla, and eggs until combined.

Stir your wet ingredients into your dry ingredients to form a thick batter. Spread half the batter on the bottom of the pan and cover with half the juicy apples. Top that with the remaining batter and remaining apples on top of that.

Bake in the oven for about 90 minutes. I always check for doneness around 75 minutes but the apples can hide pockets of underdone batter so poke around a bit.

Let cool in the pan completely before turning out onto a plate.

Enjoy.