A Simple Apple Cake

There's something nostalgic about a simple apple cake, with a cinnamony streusel topping, cut into a generous square and eaten warm on a crisp fall morning. Who doesn't love an old-fashioned coffee cake?  

Simple apple cake doesn't last long around here.

I  made this cake for a quick weeknight dessert.  We ate half for dessert and the other half for breakfast.  My youngest son was on a sleepover, and he missed the whole cake.  So I had to make it again the next day.


This cake wears many hats.  It looks elegant beside a scoop of vanilla ice cream.  It is the perfect snack with a glass of cold milk after school.  Right out of the oven, it is a special breakfast treat, served with a dollop of Greek honey yogurt.


When I say Simple Apple Cake, I mean that you can throw this cake together in 15 MINUTES.  I know a lot of recipes are purported to be QUICK, but this one really is.  And I'm a pretty slow cook, constantly distracted by kids' homework, my iPhone, and the bull moose in the backyard charging at my dogs.

Moose are "in the rut", as we say here in Wyoming.  Which means that when you see a big, testosterone-charged bull moose in your yard, you put the kids and the dogs inside and leave him alone.  Even if he is trampling your garden, chomping off the tops of your Fava bean plants and your Sugar Snap Peas, and scarfing down your small fortune invested in shrubs and trees.  You just leave that old moose alone. And pray that he doesn't get his antlers tangled up in the soccer goal.  

A mountain lion eyes our canoe intently, as we floated the Smith River in Montana last weekend.

I wasn't quick enough to get a picture of that old, cranky bull moose, but I did spy a mountain lion last weekend. Even though we know the lion thrives all over the West, it is rare indeed to get to see one up close and personal.  He was so close that he could have jumped into our canoe.  Yikes.

Simple Apple Cake

This cake is adapted from the Cooking Light Quick Baking special issue from this month.  I've tweaked it so that it will work at high altitude by cutting back on the sugar and adding more flour.  If you are closer to sea level, use 1 1/2 cups flour and 1 cup of sugar. 

• 1 3/4 cups flour (or about 7 oz.)
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 1 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp. kosher salt
• 3/4 cup low-fat, whole or buttermilk (I have used all with good results, but favor buttermilk)
• 2 Tbsp. butter, melted and cooled
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten
• 1 cup diced and peeled Granny Smith apple (about 1 apple)

For the Streusel topping:

• 1/4 cup packed brown sugar
• 2 Tbsp. flour
• 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 2 Tbsp. chilled butter, cut into small pieces

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Place flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and salt in a large mixing bowl.  Whisk well.
3. Whisk the milk, vanilla, egg and cooled melted butter together. 
4. Make a well in the center of the flour mixture, and add the wet ingredients. Stir just until moist.  Fold in the apple.
5. Pour batter into an 8 inch square pan that has been  coated with baking spray.
6. Prepare the streusel by combining the brown sugar, flour and cinnamon.  Cut in the cold butter using a fork or a pastry blender.  Sprinkle streusel over the batter.
7. Bake at 350 for 45 minutes.  Test several minutes prior with a wooden skewer; when it comes out clean, the cake is done. 
8. Cool in the pan, and cut into squares.  Serve plain, or with ice cream or yogurt. Take it to a friend's house for dinner.   Pack it in a lunch box.  Eat it over the sink.  Yum. 

Cooking is at once one of the simplest and most gratifying of the arts, but to cook well one must love and respect food.                                                      Craig Claiborne