Apple Crumble Cake with Cream Cheese Glaze

Ahhh so it’s past the halfway point in October. Halloween is right around the corner and what better way to use up the end of season apples than with this cake. You don’t need a mixer for this, a whisk will do just fine. You could use all chopped apples but I do recommend the ratio of grated to chopped because the grated apples melt into the batter and give this cake a fluffy and tender crumb.

The crumble makes this cake plenty sweet so I added a cream cheese glaze. You could totally omit it, but if you have the ingredients on hand, I HIGHLY recommend it to finish off this show stopping cake.

Here’s how I made it!

Grate and chop your apples and set aside. Whisk your dry ingredients into one bowl and your wet in another (larger) bowl. Make your crumble and set aside. Gently incorporate everything together, top with your crumble and bake for just under an hour. After it cools, make your glaze and generously drizzle on top and enjoy.

Recipe

Ingredients:

For the cake:

• 2 1/2 cups AP flour

• 1 tsp baking soda

• 1/2 tsp salt

• 1/2 tsp cinnamon

• 1/3 cup oil (avocado, vegetable, etc)*

• 2 eggs

• 1 1/2 tsp vanilla

• 1 cup brown sugar

• 1/2 cup granulated sugar

• 1 cup milk

• 1 cup grated apples

• 1 1/2 cups chopped apples

  For the crumble:

• 1 1/4 cup flour

• 1/2 cup brown sugar

• 1/4 cup white sugar

• 1 tsp cinnamon

• Pinch of salt

• 1/2 butter, melted

  For the cream cheese glaze:

• 1/2 cup cream cheese, room temperature

• 1/4 cup butter, room temperature

• 1 cup confectioners sugar

• Pinch salt

• 1-2 tbsp heavy cream

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 325 F. Spray or butter a 9x13 pan.

2. Sift your flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon in a bowl and set aside.

3. In a large bowl, whisk your eggs, vanilla and oil with the sugars until light and creamy.

4. Add the milk and whisk then gently fold in the flour. Once it is *almost* incorporated, add your grated and chopped apples and fold. Set aside while you make the crumble.

5. For the crumble, whisk the flour, sugars and salt and then pour in the butter and using a fork, give it a good mix until it has coarse crumbs and MOST of the flour has been cut in.

6. Pour the cake batter into the baking dish, top with crumb and bake for 50-55 minutes until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

7. Allow to cool before drizzling with the glaze.

8. For the glaze, mix the ingredients together using a whisk or a stand mixer. Add 1 tbsp of heavy cream at a time until it is a thick drizzling consistency.

9. Once cake has cooled down most of the way, drizzle with glaze and enjoy.

Notes:

• for the oil, any neutral oil will work. If you use coconut oil, I think it would be lovely but melt it first then continue with recipe.

• for the apples, use a variety of peeled apples. Grating some and chopping some gives texture and moisture to the cake and is worth the extra step.

• use any warm spices you enjoy… think pumpkin spice or apple pie flavours (nutmeg, ginger or cardamom would be delicious but use much less of those than cinnamon, no more than 1/4 tsp - less is more with these stronger spices)

This cake’s tender crumb is so perfect!