Apple Cake (The Secret to the Best Texture Is…)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 2 ต.ค. 2024
- Apple Cake
This recipe is adopted from Oshpaz Kelin Apple Cake: • Большой "ЯБЛОЧНЫЙ" Пир...
October 2023 update: I've improved the cake batter and made a new video about it: • Battle of the Plum Cak... In that video I use plums, but you can use apples or other fruit. Additional testing also showed that fewer apples (4 instead of 5) results in better cake texture.
Streusel Topping:
16g unbleached all-purpose flour
26g granulated sugar
15g cold butter
Mix together with fingers until it looks like bread crumbs. Put in the fridge until needed.
Cake Batter:
4 apples (about 800g before peeling and coring)
3 eggs (ideally around 85F, but at least 70F)
2.8g salt (1 tsp Diamond Crystal Kosher or 1/2 tsp Table salt)
200g granulated sugar
300g sour cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
230g unbleached all-purpose flour
15g baking powder
Preheat the oven to 350F (180C). Peel and core the apples. Cut them in half pole to pole and then slice. Butter a 13x9 (33x23cm) baking dish.
Put the eggs and salt into a bowl of a mixer and beat on high with a whisk attachment until very foamy, about 2 minutes. Add the sugar gradually on low speed. Turn up the speed to high and beat until very pale and thick, about 3 minutes, scraping down as needed. Beat in the sour cream and vanilla.
Sift the flour and baking powder. Fold into the egg mix in 3 additions using a rubber spatula (you can start it on very low in the mixer and finish with a spatula). Don’t mix too much. There should be no streaks of dry flour, but little lumps are ok. Fold in the apples. Pour into a buttered 13x9 pyrex dish. Sprinkle with the streusel topping.
Bake in the middle of the oven for 50 min or until the tester comes out clean. Let cool for at least 1 hour. Leftovers will keep till the next day, but the top crust will lose its crispness. If that happens, pop under the broiler just until it crisps up, about 1 min.
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Perfect timing. Just when I was looking for an apple cake recipe. I love cakes with sour cream and the "scary" amount of apples doesn't scare me in the least. I do think I will add a bit of cinnamon, just because I love cinnamon with apples. Thanks for this, Helen!
How much cinnamon would you add?
@@KFHesson Our family loves cinnamon so I add 1 Tbsp.
I like to cube my apples or use a mandolin slicer to julienne my apples.
We are baking this twice a week until the apple harvest is finished. Wonderful. Using yogurt instead of sour cream and adding a little cinnamon to the topping.
so glad you enjoyed it!
Yum! I just picked 10 lbs of King apples.... so of course this recipe is perfect to add to my Apple Cake recipes collection 😋
I totally understood where you were coming from when you said oil cake so that's awesome. I have also heard of using sour cream a couple of times as your fat replacement. It makes surprisingly tender stuff
i made it and it turned out great. thank you !
glad you enjoyed it!
I love butter and i hate oils😂 i would always do my carrot cake with butter.
When I saw your new video, I immediately wanted to try this cake as I love baked goods with apples but I am not a fan of the texture of butter-based cakes. Living in Greece where we don't use sour cream, it is impossible to find it in the stores. I replaced it with full-fat Greek yogurt (10% fat) mixed with some heavy cream to increase the fat content. Worked like a charm! I don't know if I ended up with the exact same result but this is definitely going to be my go-to apple cake recipe from now on! Thanks for sharing!
Great idea to use greek yogurt mixed with heavy cream!
You can’t find sour cream in Greece? Never knew they don’t sell this.
THIS look delicious! I will have to add this to my list of things I have to make. lol
Oh...I've always loved simple apple/plum cakes. With Streusel 😋
It's a very German kind of cake and brings back all kinds of pleasant childhood memories 👍
Great recipe 👍
Thank you
I love your straightforward, common sense approach to baking and cooking. Very very refreshing.
Helen, this is excellent. I followed your recipe & technique exactly (using 4 apples) and this was enjoyable all around from preparing, smelling while baking, and eating with the moist texture and taste were just perfect. Your recipe, a stand mixer and a food scale make this super-simple and fool proof, even for me an old fool who has to buy run-of-the-mill ingredients from Wal-Mart. I agree it is better without butter. Thank you.
so glad you enjoyed it!
I just made this as a way to use up the last of the apples from an orchard excursion a few weeks ago. What an excellent recipe! We love that it’s not too sweet, the crumb from the sour cream is DELIGHTFUL, and the balance of textures - apple, cake, and topping - is ideal. Thanks so much for demonstrating it!
so glad you enjoyed it!
Thank you!
I've tried with honey crisp and then a second time with granny smiths. Granny Smith worked better! The tartness balances perfectly with the sweetness.
Thank you Helen. This looks yummy and I happen to have some granny apples.
Came out amazing ! So tasty. Topping was too sweet for me, I will reduce sugar for future. This is better than sharlotka by far
Oh and skip the Streusel topping? I'm more likely to double it! 😀
Thank you for sharing this recipe ! I made this Apple Cake this morning and it was DELICIOUS ! The texture of the cake was so light and just perfect !
The cake was amazing! Just one caveat though- the streusel topping is really hard to make in a warm kitchen. The first batch was very greasy, probably due to the warmth of my fingers. The second batch I made by cutting in with 2 knives, but it took a long time and I couldnt get the butter particle size smaller than about half a pea. Any recommendations?
If your kitchen is really warm, try making the streusel topping a few hours ahead (it's fine if it gets a bit greasy). Put it in the fridge and it might solidify into a messy block. That's no problem. Crumble up this block over the cake and you are good to go.
I had a few apples starting to look sad and wanted to use them in an easy cake - and here it is with perfect timing!! THANK-YOU HELEN!!
Just made this albeit without a stand mixer and it turned out fantastic! The most delicious apple cake I've ever had (and we've been trying all the recipes on TH-cam). Thank you for sharing it and for all the tips. Can't wait to eat more tomorrow !
Looks like a really fun and easy cake using ingredients I always have on hand. Will definitely give a try next time I'm craving something sweet!
Ok ok but that Plum torte is awesome
Yummy! I can hardly wait to make this recipe. Thanks! ❤️
Definitely going to make this. I like the amount of fruit you used.
Reminds me very much of an apple cake my Great-Grandmother made. I never thought to ask her for the recipe, so this is quite a nice find. Thank you!
This looks absolutely scrumptious. As an experiment, I was thinking of substituting part of the AP flour with almond flour.
Would I need to increase the leavening? If so, what would we a good starting point?
Cake is in the oven, looking forward to the taste test. 😋
Re: butter in cakes: I hate it when people think they are improving cake recipes by swapping the oil for butter. saturated fats change the texture and so does the water phase of butter. If you must “make if fancy” use a little bit oil like walnut or hazelnut in your neutral oil.
For those people, I tell them to use ghee (clarified butter made at home or store-bought, either is fine), or lard, or tallow, instead. The whole point of it is to get that same animal fat taste without the water content messing up your chemistry, after all. That said, no, "saturated fats don't change the texture" (I mean, she added a bunch of sour cream, so those milkfats are still there. hell, the only reason that saturated fats are hated on and polyunsaturated fats were so focused on for margerines and spreads was because of the sugar industry making fats, especially saturated fats, the scapegoat of heart disease through a dedicated disinformation campaign), the water content does, because it allows the flour to develop more gluten, which is undesirable in many baked goods like biscuits or flaky pastries, and even cakes can be affected and end up feeling heavy because of it (this is why you're also not suppored to use table use spreads, as they have a higher water percentage than butter); oftentimes the correct process is not followed and things get over-mixed or under-mixed, which also causes its own problems. Baking is equated to a science for a reason, because it's the most like scientific chemistry in its preciseness of ingredients to result.
@@KainYusanagi saturated fats absolutely affect texture and it has very little to do with nutrition. Most sat fats are solid at room temperature which makes the texture of cakes high in sat fats less tender and less even. It also affect starch retrogradation which is why oil cakes tend to hold better. If you don’t believe me, you can refer to the extensive testing performed by Rose Levy Beranbaum, who wrote the Cake Bible.
Ohhhhh Helen, Heeeeelllen, I really really love you, but...... as a man from Dorset, apple cake is apple cake with butter and cider.
My passion is cooking and I'm not much of a baker - but this looks too delectable to pass up. ♥
Looks delectable!! Can't wait to try it out
Unbelievable. I was just going to look for an apple cake recipe and this popped into my notifications. I love how this channel presents the recipes and Helen is a dream-girl too, or should I say dream-lady.
I’d to make this but try to limit sweetneners. Would it drastically alter texture to reduce the cake sugar by half? I know its a humectant, maybe i could add some other liquid to offset?
I have no idea what would happen if you reduce the sugar. In baking that doesn't normally work. I suggest eating half the portion instead of reducing the sugar ;)
Helen, this looks fabulous! Thank you for showing it to us. One question - is there a way to print the recipe that you have included? Of course I can hand write it out, but just wondering if there is a way that I can have it in front of me when I bake it. I just bought some apples too! Thanks you are great. Xo
Ps did you ever get a flat baking top for your food processor?
the recipe is in the description below the video. copy and paste into a doc and print.
I'll add a bit of rum instead of the vanilla when I inevitably make this very soon.
Thanks for sharing this delicious recipe! Baked it today and am surprised how easy it is. Initially I was sceptical if the streusel will make any difference and luckily I made it, it definitely DOES make a difference to the overall taste! Thanks again!
so glad you enjoyed it!
Made this yesterday using only 2/3 of the batter recipe but all the streusel topping (only 2 of us, both watching our weight) and it's DELICIOUS! Super easy and so moist and tender! Great recipe!!
so glad it turned out well :)
Can you tell me please which sour cream precisely I must use?
@@vladimirfotografie I used regular sour cream - not the low-fat type. It was so easy and so good, well worth trying this recipe! Enjoy!!
@@andersonomo597 thank you very much!!
I love your flour sifter. Tala used to make them. I would love to know where to get one. Please do a video on sieves and where to find them. Non metallic ones for strawberries for example.
just search for a flour sifter on amazon. that's where I get all my cooking equipment.
This is *THE BEST* apple cake recipe!! I've now made it many times, sometimes just 1/3 of the recipe for just 2 of us. Simple, easy, healthy, delicious!! Yesterday I made the whole recipe and dropped off pieces to several people - all who called me and raved about it!! I fancied it up a little by frying off the apples first in a little butter and made double the streusel topping with a small handful of finely chopped walnuts. So good!! THANKS HELEN!!
Notes to self:
Sift together just shy of 2 cups of flour with 1/2 tsp salt and 3tsp. and 1/4tsp baking powder.
Add 1 cup sugar to 3 large or 4 medium eggs.
When the beaten eggs and sugar look good, add 1 cup and a 1/4 sour cream
2 cups of flour would be way too much. 1 cup of flour is 142g. but you are welcome to use any amount of flour you like. I just don't want some innocent viewer to see this conversion and think that I meant 2 cups of flour.
@@helenrennie Thanks for the correction. Do the other measurements look ok?
Many European-based cake videos, I noticed, use oil instead of butter for cake-making; I started using half butter (because I like the taste of it) and half oil, or substitute sour cream, yogurt or mayo for half the butter. Good stuff.
Just mastered pancakes. For the love of all that is holy do not use milk. Also, separate and beat egg whites.
I love your clear and detailed explanation/demonstration. I will definitely try out this cake. Thank you for sharing the recipe.
I’m going to try it but gosh! No cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg?? I’ll certainly use them!
No cinnamon, nutmeg, or apple spice?????
No snarky comment from me, although I admit before the video started I was afraid you were going to say "shortening" was the secret.
Helen, would you have an approximation for the weight of the fruit to be added? Thank you so much!
This is such a great recipe! I would love to know which other food TH-camrs you follow and recommend.
It is an apple pie, not cake, but thanks for the recipe!
Typical of NYT: all bark; no bite
❤Butter is very good for us ,because our body’s no what to do with it once we eat. it is no longer the bad guy ,just ask Mark Hyman , M D
His book Is all about Eat fat Get thin . The cake 🎂 looks amazing .
Mary.
Looks great Helen, I love apple desserts and this cake hits the spot. I'll be making it very soon. Need to get some Granny Smith Apples. Stay well and safe.
an easier but less decorative way to cut apples is to just cut offset from the center so you cut around the core, and then lay it on the flat side and repeat until you have just a square piece of core left, and if you get any bits of core in your slices just cut diagonally into it on either side of the core to remove it
I like this cake with fruit that has no butter, except for greasing the pan and the topping.
This is a typical Jewish apple cake that my mother used to make. Now I am nostalgic for it.
Sharlotka- 3 eggs,1 cup of flour, 1 cup of sugar.
No butter, no sour cream
Mm mm. Trying tomorrow!!! Thanks!!
Looks great! What properties of cakes using butter don't you prefer to ones made with other fats?
they tend to be dryer. that being said, I generally don't like cakes at all. the few cakes I like are not typical cakes ;)
@@helenrennie I'm with you, Helen! This one is a perfect vehicle for apples. I much prefer tarts - nothing like a good flaky crust, although I wouldn't say no to a nice slice of Chocolate Decadence.
Thanks again for having actual captions for the Deaf
I would really like to thank you. Excellent recipe. I tried it & I was amazed. Very easy and Fluffy. I like the way you present your recipes. And some how you also inspired respect. You combine both in your presentations. Thank you soooo much once again!
so glad you enjoyed it!
Helen are the toppings ingredients correct in the video/description? It looks like sugar has been switched with flour. I've tried to make it with your ratio and it get a lot more "wet" than on the video due to too much butter compared to flour.
There is no typo in the recipe. 16g flour, 26g sugar, 15g butter. Flour is a lot lighter than sugar. So visually, it looks like I have more flour. If you were measuring by volume, it would be 2 Tbsp sugar and 2 Tbsp flour, but if you are weighing, that volume of sugar is a lot heavier than that volume of flour. If your mixture is wet, it could be due to your butter melting. My hands are very cold, so I don't have any issues doing it with fingers, but you can always try a fork. Or cut up butter into small pieces and keep it very cold to reduce how much you need to hand it. That being said, it's a very forgiving topping. If your mixture feels too wet, put it in the fridge until it firms up, and then just break it up into little pieces.
Very delicious apple cake 😊
I tried making the cake and unfortunately the texture was not appreciated as much as it did with my previous recipe, nevertheless, it is unusual and in my opinion it tastes better after each slice being toasted well (in an over - so like a second baking stint or double baking, I believe it is called).
thanks for giving it a shot! getting doneness right on cakes can be tricky. this cake would not take good underbaked. It really needs to set completely to taste good.
More fruits cake please...
Nice!
I'll have to add this one to the list for sure.
I wished I could still travel Luxembourg …
Could you make some videos in russian? Im learning it and I would love to take cooking knowledge along with language.
There are a ton of amazing cooking channels in Russian. Check out Alex & Milana: th-cam.com/channels/iF6eFBON9K0084_cBZJ2aA.html
Can I add a teaspoon or two of cinnamon to the batter?
Would cinnamon take the topping to the next level, or ruin the cake?
it depends on if you like cinnamon ;)
My mother always uses a bit of cinnamon in the topping for apple, pear or plum cakes, sooo good.🥰😋
There’s nothing wrong with cinnamon, but I promise you apples are delicious without it, and I wish Americans would stop automatically adding it to anything that contains apples.
@@annchovy6 I live in Denmark, where Apple cake is the standard and Æbleskiver no longer has apples… we have a lot of cinnamon in our pastry too.
@@annchovy6 no Anchovies, please… (J. Geils band)
LOL, thank you for being real! So nice
I made this cake, it was ok. Too bland. I think I must love cinnamon more the the actual apples. I will try again with the addition of cinnamon.
A lovely recipe , Thanks or sharing.
What was the secret
Hello Helen,
Would you consider also including measurements in cups and teaspoons?
Love your videos.
Thank you,
Lu
Here is why I don't do cups: th-cam.com/video/ERAyGfCuZD8/w-d-xo.html For really small quantities, I do provide teaspoons.
@@helenrennie Thank you.This video is so helpful.
cake......6 Sweater......9 YOU.......10 !!!
Think this would work well with non dairy butter and sour cream?
in baking all bets are off as soon as you start to make substitutions. but it's worth a shot ;)
What works as a substitute for sour cream? I'd like to imagine anything from cottage cheese to greek yoghurt would work but in reality I've never seen a justification as to why sour cream over all other dairy products is necessary.
sour cream has a way higher fat content than either greek yogurt or cottage cheese. many any substitutions at your own risk -- this is baking, so everything matters :)
@@helenrennie thanks for the information
Stella Parks has some articles on Serious Eats where she touches on the differences between sour cream and Greek yogurt and why she’s such a fan of Greek yogurt, and non-fat at that, for baking. She has also touched on how fat content in things like milk is basically irrelevant most times. However in the case of this cake, sour cream is providing almost all the fat (aside from a little in the eggs), so I wouldn’t substitute something with much lower fat like Greek yogurt.
❤😊
I just made it and it is wonderful. Of course I did not wait 1 hour to try it
so glad you enjoyed it! I rarely wait 1 hour either :)
Can you whisk with a hand mixer instead of a stationary mixer?
Yes, she mentioned that you can use a hand mixer instead of a stand mixer; it'll just be a lot more work for your arm and wrist as you move it around to mix it all up mostly uniformly (the blades are much smaller on hand mixers generally, and the power lower; this means that you often can't just sit it in the middle of the bowl and let it go).
Can you do a video on the science of a perfect cupcake/muffin кексик??
maybe not a video on cupcakes/muffins (partially because I really dislike them), but the key technique in them is creaming butter and sugar properly. It's actually incredibly tricky to get right, that's why many baked goods fail. I will try to make a video on that technique.
In spite of how a lot of people treat them, muffins and cupcakes are two different things. A muffin is a quick bread just like scones and pancakes are. They are meant to be far less sweet, have a different texture, and less richness than cupcakes. Muffins aren’t typically made with the creaming method the way cupcakes usually are. They are more likely made with what’s known as the blending method, which involves melted butter. Or they are also made by working the fat into the flour in a sort of reverse creaming method. They should be lightly sweet. Personally a muffin that has more than 50-60% sugar in relation to flour stops being a muffin to me. It should also have a hardier texture than a cupcake, which is more fine-crumbed and delicate.
I’m going to make this today!
This is great. Thank you.
I agree!!! ❤❤ looks delicious!
I don’t have a processor. Will immersion blender work for mixing the eggs?
I am not using a food processor. I am using a mixer. A hand mixer would work. Some immersion blenders have a whisk attachment, so that could work, but a blender attachment might not (I have no idea since I haven't tried that).
If you have a strong arm and patience, it can be nicely done by hand with a whisk.
@@helenrennie that just shows how much I now about kitchen appliances 🤦♀️
I noticed a lot of apple dishes in European countries do not add cinnamon or spices to the apples.
Most French chefs I know joke that Americans need cinnamon in every dessert ;) Somehow no one asked me if they can add cardamom to this cake. But around 10 people mentioned cinnamon. I am cool with it either way. It's just funny to me that some people can't possibly live without it.
@@helenrennie I am sure cinnamon is addictive. each time we use cinnamon, a little more gets used.
This reminds me of cuca, which is a brazilian cake with fruits in it, it also has the crumble on top.
I thought the same thing!
But I think that in cuca we put the fruit just on the top, not mixed with the dough.
Hmm, kuchen! I love how languages are all intermingled.
Cinammon?
Of course you can add cinnamon. I did, yumm
Yum! What brand of sour cream do you use? Will Daisy be good?
I really like "organic valley" sour cream, but any sour cream will work
@@helenrennie thank you!!
yes, yes, yeeeeeesssssss
"snarky" 🤭🙃🤭
look great
🙏🏻😎🙏🏻
Dorie Greenspan’s French apple cake is pretty fantastic. It’s mostly apple with a little batter.
As for butter in cakes, I don’t like oil-based cakes except if they’re sponges, such as chiffon. Or olive oil cakes where the oil actually contributes flavor (a lot are typically sponge cakes, too). Carrot cake is better when it’s made with brown butter or when it’s got oil but is a sponge cake. It’s honestly overly oily and sodden as typically made, which is a problem with oil-based cakes.
The plum torte is very overrated. This does not prove that cakes are better without butter. And well, Helen admits herself that she’s not much of a baker or that big a fan of sweets, so I think her view is perhaps a bit skewed/limited on this subject sometimes.
Oh, and sour cream works great in the same way as a classic whipped cream cake does: you’re replacing butter with cream, so the dairy fat is still there. I recommend everyone give a whipped cream cake a try. It’s light, moist, and fine-crumbed.
Yeah, I was going to comment something similar; the butter is important as a fat not just because of its specific properties, but also the dairy fats that give their specific flavour profiles rather than just adding a lot of heavy vegetable oil flavour; using sour cream instead retains that while adding a slight sourness (obviously) that makes it just that much more creamier. There are also a wide variety of butters available, not just one consistant flavour (even from the same companies that do blend many cow's milk together to form the butter, because the processes and additives differ), and a cultured butter might provide the same flavour profile that is desired with using the sour cream without needing a secondary oil. Similarly, one could use ghee (clarified butter), tallow, or lard as the oil source, not just vegetable-based oils, and I've found that using them actually makes the end product much more flavourful, generally. Shortening isn't something I've ever enjoyed using, and it rarely actually works well, in my experience. It doesn't break down in mixing as much, probably due to the process they use to make it solid at room temperature; Coconut oil, which naturally is solid at room temperature, doesn't have the same issue of refusing to break down and combine, by comparison.
Secret to the best texture for a gluten-free cake?
Seems to me that 15g of BP is a lot. Is that correct?
It is. That's just over 1 Tbsp. If this was baking soda, that would indeed be unusual, but this is baking powder.
@@helenrennie Thanks. I made this last night and it was really good. I used exactly 15g of BP even though it sounded like a lot but it was spot on.