Apple Yogurt Cake

I had two different things I wanted to accomplish on Thursday morning. 1) Though today’s temps missed the memo (thanks global warming for an 85-degree day … ), I wanted to make something fall-y to bring home with me this weekend. 2) I had some yogurt that I bought last week at the farmer’s market that I needed to finish before I left.

I’d never considered yogurt as a baking resource, so I was surprised to find so many recipes for yogurt cake, with berries, citrus fruits, apples, nuts — you name it. After browsing for days, I settled on this Epicurious recipe for Grandmother’s Apple Cake, mostly because it’s from the Van Gogh’s Table cookbook and I like to pretend that this means that Van Gogh’s grandmother baked this up while Vincent was painting. Riiight.

Since I was taking it home with me, I wanted something that would travel easy and taste just as fresh the next day. This recipe fit the bill, since it gets better the day after you make it. And coincidentally, the farmer’s market happened to be at Columbia on Thursday morning, so I could pick up fresh apples for the cake. Clearly, it was fate.

The cake was moist, slightly sweet but mostly spicy — a perfect accompaniment to coffee or tea. The only thing I might change the next time I make it is swapping either brown sugar, honey or even maple syrup for some of the sugar, but the cake had plenty of flavor without it. Another plus: the cake gets better with time. It’s a little spicier, more moist and more apple-y — it’s like the pieces of apple have smushed their flavor into the cake itself. (Yes, smushed is the technical term.)

Apple Yogurt Cake

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Description

The recipe suggests Golden Delicious or Jonagold apples, but I went with Ginger Golds. They have a little more tartness than the GDs, which I prefer. They’re a little smaller too, so I added a third apple to the recipe.

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Scale 1x2x3x

Ingredients

• 3 apples, cored and peeled
• 1 cup plain yogurt
• 1–1/4 cups sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil
• 3 large eggs
• 2–3 tablespoons butter
• 1–1/2 tablespoons cinnamon
• 1/2 tablespoon nutmeg
• 2 tablespoons unsweetened apple butter

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Instructions

1. Peel and core the apples, and then coarsely chop them. I don’t have an apple corer, so after peeling, I just cut the apples into quarters and then cut the seeds off that way.
2. Whisk together the yogurt with the sugar.
3. Next, mix in the flour and baking soda. Then add the vegetable oil and eggs. Mix well until you have a smooth batter.
4. Melt the butter on medium-high heat. Saute the apples until they’re golden brown, stirring occasionally. Add the cinnamon, nutmeg and unsweetened apple butter, which I happened to have on hand (the recipe calls for Calvados, an apple brandy). It also uses less cinnamon, but I liked the extra spice in the end product, so I definitely recommend it.
5. Take the apples off the heat, and if you’re following the recipe, let them cool while you make the batter. If you’re me, freak out that they’re way too hot to put in the batter immediately, stick them in the fridge for 10 minutes, then panic again when they’re still pretty warm but stick them in the batter anyway and hope and pray that those chunks in your batter are pieces of apple and not scrambled eggs.
6. Bake the cake in a well-greased pan. The recipe says that an 8-inch round cake pan bakes at 350F in 45-55 minutes. I used a 9-x-9-inch baking dish and the cake baked up perfectly in 35.

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