Many People's Mom's Apple Cake

It turns out that what I do in the fall is make apple cake. When I realize I've been overenthusiastic about buying apples from the farmer's market, I make apple cake.

When a freak October snowstorm covers the driveway with branches and causes the power to be out for 5 days, I make apple cake. (With the assistance of my tenant, who baked it in his oven since mine--with its electric starter--was out of commission.)

When four young women who are on the Smith College crew team come to my house as part of their "rent-a-rower" fundraiser and move nearly 2 cords of wood onto my porch in 2 hours, I make apple cake.

But really, it's not like I need much of an excuse. If there are apples, I'll make apple cake. And I'm writing this now in the hopes that you will too.

I discovered this recipe last fall on Smitten Kitchen. Deb called it "Mom's Apple Cake" because it was one of her mother's specialties. As it turns out, if you read the hundreds of comments that followed, lots of people's moms made this cake.

There is a reason for that--it's delicious. Also, easy to make and large enough to feed a crowd. The other thing that's nice is that it's forgiving. Each time I make it--either accidentally or on purpose--I tweak it a bit. I swap out the orange juice for apple cider. I use some whole wheat pastry flour instead of white. Maybe I'll cut down the sugar or the oil a bit--or maybe I won't. And each time, it's delicious. The apple to cake ratio is almost even, and the cake crumbles around the apples--or perhaps it's the apples melting into the cake--in a most delightful way. I've brought this cake to parties and to work, I've fed those hardworking Smith students with it as well as my companions in the dark of the freak snowstorm. No matter the circumstances, it is welcome.

One note about baking. The original recipe calls for a tube pan. I didn't have one so the first few times I made the cake, I made it in a 9" by 13" pan instead. This works fine, for the most part. The cake is best when the cake and apples are layered, and that's a bit trickier in the sheet pan, just because it takes most of the batter to cover the bottom of the pan. Still, it's worth it to try to layer, even if you put 2/3 of the batter down and then 2/3 of the apples, then top with the remaining 1/3 of each.

This past weekend, on a bit of a whim, I purchased a tube pan. Except I didn't get the 2-parted tube pan that lets you make the cake right-side up but a one piece tube pan that you have to turn over. Using a pan with a smaller surface area meant that the layering was much easier, and the apples and walnuts were nicely integrated into the cake.

And the bottom of the cake, upon its exit from the oven, was quite lovely:

It did not, alas, come out of the pan clean, even though I had assiduously buttered and floured it. This is what it looked like after I attempted to patch up the bare spots. Still, that it was not beautiful (or whole) did not mean that it was not still delicious.

I know it is nearly Thanksgiving and everyone's cooking focus is on pie and stuffing, cranberry sauce and sweet potatoes. Even so, I hope that there might still be an occasion where a cake like this--sturdy, tasty, seasonal--can find a place at the table.

Many People's Mom's Apple Cake
Adapted from Smitten Kitchen

6 apples, MacIntosh, or a mix
1 tablespoon cinnamon
5 tablespoons sugar

2 3/4 cups flour, sifted (Can swap out some of the white for whole wheat pastry flour)
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup vegetable oil (If you cut down on the oil, add more juice or cider to make up for the liquid.)
2 cups sugar (Can go down to 1 3/4 cups; you can also swap out 1/2 cup of the white for brown)
1/4 cup orange juice or apple cider
2 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
4 eggs
1 cup walnuts, chopped (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a tube pan or a 9 x 13 sheet pan. Peel, core and chop apples into chunks. Toss with cinnamon and sugar and set aside.

Stir together flour, baking powder and salt in a large mixing bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together oil, orange juice or cider, sugar and vanilla. Mix wet ingredients into the dry ones, then add eggs, one at a time. Scrape down the bowl to ensure all ingredients are incorporated.

Pour half of batter into prepared pan. Spread half of apples over it. Pour the remaining batter over the apples and arrange the remaining apples on top. Bake for about 1 1/2 hours, or until a tester comes out clean.

Baking Note: Keep an eye on the timer. I'd recommend starting to check after an hour. If you're making it in a 9 x 13 pan, it will probably only need an hour to an hour and 15 minutes to bake. In my tube pan (which is heavy), it baked in an hour and 20 minutes.

Rhubarb Ginger "Downside Up" Oatmeal Cake

Much to my surprise, I discovered that in today's "Good Appetite" column, Melissa Clark writes about rhubarb upside-down cake. There must be rhubarb upside-down cake vibes going around in the universe because I made a similar cake just yesterday. I'd certainly think about making Melissa's cake at some point, but that will have to happen later. First, I want to make yesterday's cake again, if only so I can have a bigger piece of it. I brought it to a work gathering and looked on a little bit sadly as wedge after wedge was eaten by my colleagues, including the ones who proclaimed not to like rhubarb. I was selfless enough to take one piece home for Alex, but I left the rest there, and when I came in this morning, it was all gone. Sigh.

I have Food 52 to blame (or, really, credit) for this one as well. When I did a search for rhubarb, the first recipe that came up was the one for rhubarb curd (shortbread). The second was for rhubarb ginger downside up oatmeal cake. I was intrigued. I clicked. I baked.

I've never made a cake quite like this before. First, I don't think I've ever made an upside down cake. And I've never made one in a cast iron frying pan. I may have made a cake with oatmeal in it at some point, but the details are fuzzy. But, having done this once, I would do it again without hesitation. This is really an excellent cake.

First, you melt some butter in a cast iron (or other ovenproof) frying pan:

Once the butter is melted, you take it off the flame and spread a cup of brown sugar across the bottom:
On top of that goes a layer of rhubarb mixed with grated fresh ginger:


And on top of that goes the cake batter:


The cake batter process was interesting in and of itself. You mix rolled oats with boiling water and butter. You mix the dry ingredients in another bowl. When the oatmeal mixture has cooled, you add an egg, some vanilla and more sugar, and then mix in the dry ingredients.

The cake one way:


And the other:


There is little I would do differently. I might think about replacing the fresh ginger with crystallized ginger (or maybe not). I did replace 1/4 cup of all purpose with whole wheat pastry flour. But there's not much else to change. The slight taste of oatmeal is lovely with the rhubarb, reminiscent of a crumble. The cake was moist and flavorful, with a little zing from the ginger, some tart from the rhubarb, mellowed out by the oatmeal and the sweet cake. It really was just all around delicious. My only regret was that I hadn't brought some vanilla ice cream to eat with it. No, I take that back. My only real regret was that I didn't get a bigger piece. I'm not sure I could give it higher praise.

Rhubarb Ginger Downside-Up Cake
from thirshfeld at Food 52

For the rhubarb::

• 2 1/4 cups fresh rhubarb, 1/2 inch slices
• 1 tablespoon fresh ginger, grated
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup unsalted butter

For the oatmeal cake:

• 1/2 cup thick cut rolled oats
• 3/4 cups boiling water
• 1/4 cup unsalted butter, 1/4 inch cubes
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

1. In a mixing bowl combine the oats with the boiling water. Add the1/4 cup of butter. Set aside to cool.


2. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Gently melt the butter in a 10 inch cast iron skillet. Remove it from the heat. Spread the brown sugar evenly across the bottom. In a large bowl mix the ginger and rhubarb. Spread the rhubarb evenly across the brown sugar. Set aside.


3. In the empty rhubarb bowl combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.


4. To the cooled oatmeal add the egg, both sugars, and vanilla. Mix to combine. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix until combined.


5. Spread the cake batter evenly across the top of the rhubarb. Place into the oven and bake for 30-40 minutes.


6. Remove from the oven when done and let cool for 5 minutes before inverting onto a cake plate. Let cool for 20 minutes before slicing.

8-10 slices

Marion Cunningham's Fresh Ginger Cake

This cake, I realized as I was making it on Sunday, carries on my tradition of making plain cakes, those delicious though not decadent and, sad to say, not particularly attractive cakes. (Plain cake number one on this blog was this Lemon Cornmeal Cake and plain cake number two was the Blueberry Buttermilk Cake.) Plain they may be, but I think of them as plain in a stalwart, upstanding kind of way. Just because they are plain does not mean they are not delicious.

This ginger cake is actually very similar to the Fresh Ginger Muffins that Molly posted about on Orangette a few months ago. The process is exactly the same--the cake has a bit more sugar than the muffins and is supposed to have cake flour in it, but otherwise, the ingredients are the same as well. And the process is also interesting in that Cunningham uses ginger in a way I've never used it before. You take chunks of ginger, skin and all, and whirl them around in a food processor or mini chopper until they are chopped to bits. Then, you add a bit of sugar and heat it on the stove until the sugar melts, leaving you with a sticky, lovely smelling mess, to which you add lemon zest. This is what gives the cake its lovely gingery-lemony flavor.

The wonderful thing that I realized is how excellent this cake--delicious enough on its own-- would be as a base for other things. Cunningham suggests serving it with sliced mango and whipped cream. (Yum.) I made it specifically to go with the Rhubarb Curd (Double Yum.) But I can also imagine a ginger-lemon blueberry cake, to name one. (Minus the ginger, this recipe is already quite similar to the blueberry buttermilk cake linked above.) Despite the plainness of this cake, it's moist and light and very flavorful. I can already see it becoming a regular in my repertoire! Meanwhile, it might be the slightest bit more photogenic if the rhubarb curd wasn't exactly the same color, but you can't have everything!

Fresh Ginger Cake

(adapted from Marion Cunningham's The Breakfast Book)

Makes two 8" cakes

Ingredients:
1/4 cup ginger, unpeeled, cut into large chunks
1 cup sugar
3 tablespoons lemon zest with a little white pith (I used the zest from 2 1/2 lemons.)
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
2 eggs
1 cup buttermilk
2 cups cake flour (I used all-purpose)
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon baking soda

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Butter the cake pans.

Cut the unpeeled ginger root into large chunks. Put the ginger into a food processor and process until it is in tiny pieces; alternatively, mince by hand. Put the ginger and ¼ cup sugar in a small skillet and cook over medium heat, stirring, until the sugar has melted and the mixture is warm (this takes only a minute or two). Set aside to cool. Zest the lemon and add it to the cooled ginger mixture. (Cunningham says to do this in a food processor; if you have a Microplane-type grater, there's no need.)

Put the butter in the bowl of a stand mixer (or, a mixing bowl, if you plan to use handheld beaters or mix by hand). Beat the butter for a second or two; slowly add the remaining 3/4 cup sugar, and beat until smooth. Add the eggs, and beat well. Stir in the buttermilk, and beat until blended. Add the flour, salt, and baking soda, and beat just until smooth. Add the ginger-lemon mixture and mix well.

Spoon the batter into the buttered cake pans. Bake for 25 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool the pans for 5 minutes, then turn out onto racks until completely cooled.

Blueberry Buttermilk Cake (aka another plain cake)

I have to admit it--I'm a blueberry hoarder. Every summer, I make sure that I go blueberry picking at least once (and usually twice), and even though I might make muffins or crumble right then, I make sure that I have several large ziplock bags full of frozen berries in my freezer shortly thereafter. And I find myself somewhat reluctant to use them in the first cooler months--I start to envision a blueberry-less February, and I don't want to do that to myself. (I know, of course, that blueberries are available in the frozen foods department of any grocery store, but I'm always more attached to the berries I've picked myself--they're tangible proof that it was summer once and therefore must be again.) By late winter and early spring, though, I'm a bit more profligate with the berries, and by this time of year, I'll bake with them weekly--blueberry season, after all, is actually in sight, if still several months away. And it's even more heartening this year to see that there are berries developing on the biggest of my three baby blueberry bushes. (I'm thinking I might put a couple more in, if I can figure out where--who needs all that lawn, anyway?)

I was thinking about making blueberry muffins today, but I wasn't in the mood for either of my usual blueberry muffin recipes. And I'd seen this recipe up on Smitten Kitchen last week, as raspberry buttermilk cake, and had noted it as something I might want to make eventually, but I didn't think too much about it. But today, I was flipping through the June issue of Gourmet and saw the recipe again, and this time, something stuck--probably it was when I realized that this would be an excellent cake with blueberries as well as raspberries.

This cake is easy, easy, easy, and it's also nice in that it's not that bad for you. It has a half stick of butter and a single egg in the whole cake. You could even, maybe, call it a somewhat virtuous cake (unless, of course, you feel compelled to eat half of it at one sitting.). And it's definitely delicious. It's not quite a one bowl cake, but it's 2 bowls, only one of which really gets dirty, and one measuring cup for the buttermilk. I was generous with the blueberries on top, and I put some lemon zest in the batter, since I'm a big fan of the lemon/blueberry combo (Exhibit A). It took all of 15 minutes (if that) to put together, and it was out of the oven and cool enough to eat in less than an hour.

As for the serving size, I want to quote Laurie Colwin, who wrote this in her chapter on "How to Make Gingerbread" in her wonderful book of food essays, Home Cooking:

"This little three-layer cake will feed six delicate, well-mannered people with small appetites who are on diets and have just had a large meal, or four fairly well-mannered people who are not terribly hungry. Two absolute pigs can devour it in one sitting--half for you and half for me--with a glass of milk and a cup of coffee and leave not a crumb for anyone else."

I won't say that that's what Alex and I did this afternoon. But I will say that there is perhaps a third of the cake left, and I know already that it's lovely with tea, so I won't guarantee it lasting past tomorrow.

Blueberry Buttermilk Cake
Adapted from Gourmet, June 2009

The original recipe called for raspberries, and I obviously used blueberries. Any type of berry seems like it would suffice. I'm also contemplating how this might work with rhubarb instead of berries. It feels like a generally flexible recipe, so I'll bet lots of variations could work.

Makes one thin 9-inch cake--see note on number of servings above.

1 cup all-purpose flour (I used 1/3 whole wheat pastry flour)
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 stick unsalted butter, softened
2/3 cup plus 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar, divided
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest (optional)
1 large egg
1/2 cup well-shaken buttermilk
1 cup fresh berries (I used 1 1/2 cups frozen blueberries.)

Preheat oven to 400°F with rack in middle. Butter and flour a 9-inch round cake pan.

Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt and set aside. In a larger bowl, beat butter and 2/3 cup sugar with an electric mixer at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about two minutes, then beat in vanilla and zest, if using. Add egg and beat well.

At low speed, mix in flour mixture in three batches, alternating with buttermilk, beginning and ending with flour, and mixing until just combined.Spoon batter into cake pan, smoothing top. Scatter berries evenly over top and sprinkle with remaining 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar.

Bake until cake is golden and a wooden pick inserted into center comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Cool in pan 10 minutes, then turn out onto a rack and cool to warm, 10 to 15 minutes more. Invert onto a plate.

(Deb and many of her commenters said their cakes baked in 20 minutes. Mine did not. At 25 minutes, the middle was still a bit jiggly, so I left it in for 5 more minutes, and it was perfect.)

Plain Cakes

I do realize this is Monday--the last Monday in May, in fact, so the last possibility for a May Meatless Monday. And I did, in fact, make a nice vegetarian lunch today for my brother, sister-in-law, nieces and Alex. However, I went with the tried and true and made two recipes I've already written about--the asparagus soup from Greens and the Chard-Onion Torta from Deborah Madison's vegetarian supper book. So, Meatless Monday is going to be postponed for another day, and instead I'm going to write about cake.

Over the years, I've come to the sad conclusion that I'm never going to be a person who makes beautiful desserts. I make really tasty desserts, usually. But they're not beautiful. I noticed this especially a few years ago when it seemed like I had lots of potluck things to go to (like wedding and baby showers) where I brought dessert, and whatever less-than-beautiful dessert I had brought would be sitting there, forlornly, amidst beautifully decorated cupcakes and perfectly frosted cakes and fancy brownies with squiggles of frosting. They'd sit there until someone would, seemingly out of politeness, take a piece of whatever it was I brought, and then the word would spread that it was really good, despite its outward appearance, and suddenly my dessert would join the popular crowd of desserts, and eventually there would only be crumbs left. (This definitely happened when I brought Karen Templer's pumpkin bars to a baby shower for someone who seemed to have an unusually high percentage of friends capable of making lovely desserts. The downside was that once my pumpkin bars were discovered, I didn't have any to take home to have with tea the next morning.)

But I really appreciate cakes that are easy to make and don't use up a lot of dishes and don't require fancy ingredients and maybe aren't the prettiest cakes ever but still taste delicious. One of these is the beloved and still dearly missed Laurie Colwin's Buttermilk Cocoa Cake, from More Home Cooking. (The last one on this page). Another possibility is the Everyday Cake that Molly wrote about in Orangette a few weeks ago. (I haven't made this yet, but one of my colleagues did and said it was great.) And a third is this lemon cornmeal cake.


I have Karen Templer to thank for this one too. She raved about it on the Readerville food thread not long ago, and I bookmarked the recipe. I hadn't actually planned to make this cake today, but after I'd made the rest of the food for lunch, I got a call that my lunch guests were going to be late. I puttered around for a bit, and then I thought, "Well, I could make something else . . . " and I remembered this cake. I got as far as melting the butter and juicing the lemon when everyone arrived. So, later in the afternoon, after we'd already had lunch and an excellent afternoon snack of ice cream from my wonderful local ice cream shop--Mt. Tom's Homemade--and, in fact, after everyone was gone, I remembered the already melted butter and decided to make the cake, despite not actually needing any more dessert.

This was not a one bowl cake, like some easy cakes--there's a dry bowl, a wet bowl and a butter bowl--but it comes together quickly.


It's just a matter of mixing wet and dry ingredients separately, mixing them together, and then pouring the batter in the pan. The glaze is about as easy as a glaze can be. The cake is not beautiful--but you wouldn't expect it to be. It has a lovely texture, from the cornmeal, and tenderness from the buttermilk. It's lightly lemony and entirely irresistible. It does its plain cake brethren proud, and I'll definitely be making it again.

Lemon Cornmeal Cake with Lemon Glaze and Crushed Blueberry Sauce

From Bon Appetit, April 2009

Ingredients

Glaze

• 1 1/2 cups (packed) powdered sugar, sifted
• 2 tablespoons (or more) fresh lemon juice

Cake

• 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 1/3 cup yellow cornmeal
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 3 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup buttermilk
• 2 large eggs
• 1 tablespoon finely grated lemon peel
• 3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted, cooled
• Crushed-Blueberry Sauce

Preparation

glaze

• Combine powdered sugar and 2 tablespoons lemon juice in small bowl. Stir with spoon until smooth and paste-like, adding more lemon juice by 1/2 teaspoonfuls if glaze is too thick to spread. Set aside.

cake

• Position rack in center of oven and preheat to 350°F. Butter 9-inch-diameter cake pan with 2-inch-high sides; line bottom with parchment. Combine flour, cornmeal, sugar, baking powder, and salt in large bowl; whisk to blend. Whisk buttermilk, eggs, lemon peel, and vanilla in small bowl. Pour buttermilk mixture and melted butter into flour mixture. Using rubber spatula, gently fold liquids into flour mixture until just blended (do not stir). Scrape batter into pan; spread evenly.
• Bake cake until tester inserted into center comes out clean and cake pulls away from sides of pan, about 30 minutes.
• Immediately run knife around sides of cake. Place rack atop cake in pan. Using oven mitts, hold pan and rack firmly together and invert cake onto rack. Remove pan from cake. Place another rack on bottom of cake; invert 1 more time so that cake is top side up. Stir glaze until blended. While cake is still very hot, drop glaze by tablespoonfuls onto cake; spread to within 1/2 inch of edge (some glaze may drip down sides of cake). Cool completely. Serve with Crushed-Blueberry Sauce.

My Notes:

* I only used 1 cup of sugar for the glaze, plus about 2 tbsp. of lemon juice, and I had some left over. I'd go down to maybe 3/4 of a cup of sugar and slightly less lemon juice next time.

* I used 1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour and 1 cup all purpose flour. I might also try doing half white whole wheat and half all purpose.

*I didn't make the blueberry sauce, but I'm leaving the link to the recipe in, since I know that lemons and blueberries are a fine combo.

*I only have one cooling rack so couldn't do the complicated pan-rack maneuver they suggest for getting the cake out of the pan. I turned it out onto a plate and then back right side up on the cooling rack so it could cool.