Apple Cake with Cinnamon-Butter Sauce

One of my friends hosted us all at her house the other weekend, and I was in charge of bringing dessert. Since my family and I recently went apple picking, I wanted to use the abundance of apples we had sitting on our counter before they went to waste. But I wanted it to be something different. Do you know how hard it is to find an apple dessert recipe that isn't in the form of a pie?

It's hard.

I came across this apple cake and I figured if we heated it up, served it with ice cream and had a sauce to accompany it, it would be a perfect dessert for our crowd. The sauce I came up with made the cake even moister (let's pretend it's a word) and was perfect with the ice cream melting on top. I love the chunks of apple inside as well because they add a contrast to the moist (and moister!) cake. This is a great fall recipe that you'll love. Plus it's even better for breakfast the next day. Enjoy!

Printable Recipe

Ingredients

Cake

• 6 baking apples
• 1 tbsp. cinnamon
• 5 tbsp. sugar (I used Splenda blend)
• 2 3/4 cups flour, sifted
• 1 tbsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 1 cup granulated sugar (I used Splenda blend)
• 1 cup light brown sugar
• 1/4 cup orange juice
• 2 1/2 tsp. vanilla
• 4 eggs

Sauce

• 4 tbsp. butter or margarine
• 2/3 cup light brown sugar
• 1/3 cup low-fat milk
• 1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
• Ice cream, for serving

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a tube pan. Peel, core and chop apples into chunks. Toss with cinnamon and 5 tbsp. sugar and set aside.

Sift together flour, baking powder and salt in a large mixing bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together oil, orange juice, sugars 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.

Towards the end of baking, heat sauce ingredients in a saucepan over medium heat until butter is melted and sauce is hot. You can also make this ahead of time and reheat it prior to serving.

Serve warm sauce over warm cake. Top with ice cream.

Source: Cake: Adapted from Smitten Kitchen; Sauce: SK Original