Anytime apple cake

With just enough batter to hold it all together

Apples are easy to love. If your familiarity is with grocery store apples - the likes of red and golden delicious, Fuji, and Granny Smith - perhaps they don’t carry the same seduction as if you keep a ready supply of Stayman Winesap, Somerset, Evercrisp, and La Reinette russets around… Many farmers markets and orchards with pick-your-own opportunities offer a growing selection of both heirloom and hybrid apple varieties these days, and the eating has never been better.

Today features a *sublime brown sugar + spice apple cake*, perfect for snacking, any time of day. It is just sweet-enough and incorporates heirloom wheat (for both flavor, and greater nutrition). Which really does mean you can have your cake and eat it too! This recipe is for paid subscribers - if you’re already a paying subscriber, keep scrolling, and a huge THANKS for your support!

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Before we dive into all things apple, a brief announcement for local subscribers: One of my last events of the year is approaching - a very special Wild Alaska autumn dinner, October 12th.

This family style feast will feature bounty from pristine Alaska waters and harvests from Catbird Cottage gardens. The evening includes a wildcrafted autumnal vermouth at cocktail hour, handmade pici pasta + salmon chicarones, cured sockeye salmon with chicories, pickled wild blueberries, asian pear+chive relish, slow roasted black cod + koginut squash with an Aleppo-gochugaru-sesame sauce, buttery salmon, fennel, bay leaves + late season garlic-tomato confit, plus more. The event will take place under the stars at the property of botanical artist, Wendy Hollender, and fisherwoman Nelly of Drifters Fish from Alaska will be a featured guest. If you’d like to join us, send me a message or email for more details and to reserve your seat at the table. This will be a one-of-a-kind experience.

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Returning to today’s story…. This is an apple cake I realized needed to exist but that I hadn’t found yet. It resembles others on the internet, but with a few *me* tweaks that I think you’ll agree are clear improvements. Tweaks that mean you too will be adding this to the cold season repertoire, on repeat.

This moist snacking cake possesses a tender crumb and soft (but still intact), juicy apples throughout. The proportions make it so there’s just enough batter to hold the apples together, and the layers of brown sugar-spice bring surprise and depth.

If you’d like to head straight to the recipe, just scroll a little further. :)

I thought to share some apple knowledge I’ve learned over time, all of which has improved how I cook and eat…. perhaps this info can help you eat more joyfully, too. As I’ve explored, I realize I seek very juicy apples with rich, tart flavor. Which is probably no surprise if you follow me here and see how I like to cook.

There are apples better suited to eating out of hand, and others that make good candidates for cooking or baking. I freely admit I am turned-off by mushy cooked apples - if I want that, I’ll make applesauce. Below are a few of my favorite cooking apples, and two eating out of hand varieties that we keep a whole crisper drawerful, for eating everyday… as the late great writer David Foster Wallace once wrote, apples are the broom of the system.