Christmas

Apple Cake with Rum Sauce

December  1, 2014
4.8
4 Ratings
  • Serves 8
What You'll Need
Ingredients
  • For the apple cake:
  • 1 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
  • 8 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1/8 cup water
  • 1/2 cup toasted pecans or walnuts, chopped
  • 2 1/2 cups Granny Smith apples (about 3), peeled, cored, and diced into small pieces
  • For the rum sauce:
  • 1/4 cup heavy cream
  • 3/4 cup brown sugar
  • 8 tablespoons unsalted butter
  • 1 tablespoon rum
  • a good pinch of salt
Directions
  1. For the apple cake:
  2. Preheat the oven to 350° F. Butter an 8-inch round cake pan (make sure cake pan is at least 2 inches tall). Line the bottom of the pan with parchment paper, then butter and flour the parchment.
  3. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Set aside.
  4. In the bowl of a standing mixer, beat together the butter and sugar until fluffy, 3 to 5 minutes.
  5. Beat in the egg and vanilla and mix until well blended.
  6. Add the dry ingredients alternately with the water, and beat the batter until smooth, about 30 seconds. Stir in the apples and walnuts.
  7. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan and bake the cake 25 to 35 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.
  8. Cool in the pan for 30 minutes, then turn the cake out onto a cooling rack and cool completely, removing parchment paper.
  9. Move cake to a serving plate, and top with rum sauce (recipe follows).
  1. For the rum sauce:
  2. Combine all the sauce ingredients together in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Cook until butter is melted, sugar is dissolved, and the sauce is smooth.

See what other Food52ers are saying.

  • BocaCindi
    BocaCindi
  • bryan
    bryan
  • S. Rodriguez
    S. Rodriguez
  • sarah kieffer | the vanilla bean blog
    sarah kieffer | the vanilla bean blog
A baker's soliloquy. You can follow along at thevanillabeanblog.com.

7 Reviews

BocaCindi February 18, 2015
Loved this apple cake. Used two granny smiths which ended up being three cups of diced apples and a heaping 1/2 cup of walnuts. Used 9 inch springform pan. Thirty minutes with tinfoil on bottom in case of leakage and five minutes without the foil. Added another tablespoon of rum to sauce. Refrigerated cake before serving. Room temp sauce. A scoop of vanilla ice cream for serving would send this right over the top. Delicious. Thank you, Sarah.
 
Jeri January 11, 2015
This cake is very good. I had everything in my pantry to make and am glad I did. One thing, it did take my cake about 45 minutes to bake. Rum sauce is delish, I poured it over the entire cake.
 
bryan December 30, 2014
A bit sugary for me, but I did enjoy it, especially the buttercream. This could be my oven (it's not the best)--but I had to bake the cake for nearly twice as long as the recipe called for. But those are minor quibbles.

An economy suggestion: mixing the dry ingredients while the butter fluffs in the stand mixer.
 
S. R. December 29, 2014
Oh! You had me at rum sauce!! This was absolutely divine! This is definetly on the New Years Eve menu!!
 
Hales December 17, 2014
Do you serve the cake room temperature, with the sauce warm?
 
susan E. December 3, 2014
Where are the apples in this recipe?
 
sarah K. December 3, 2014
!!! Sorry about that! They are there now. :)