High Altitude Apple Pie Cake with Cinnamon Cookie Crumble
This apple pie cake has four layers of spiced apple cider cake with spiced buttercream, apple pie filling, and cinnamon cookie crumbles on top.
All recipes on Curly Girl Kitchen are developed for high altitude at 5,280 feet. See FAQs for adjusting to higher or lower elevations.
Equipment
- Stand Mixer with Whisk Attachment
Ingredients
Apple Pie Filling
- 2 lbs apples (3-4 large apples)
- 2 tbsp lemon juice
- 2 tbsp water
- ¼ cup dark brown sugar, lightly packed
- ¼ tsp ground cinnamon
- ⅛ tsp ground nutmeg
- ⅛ tsp ground cloves
Cake
- 3 ¼ cups all-purpose flour, spooned and leveled
- 1 ½ tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- ½ tsp ground ginger
- ¼ tsp ground cloves
- ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
- ¾ cup apple cider concentrate
- 1 ½ cups dark brown sugar, lightly packed
- 1 cup unsweetened applesauce
- ½ cup vegetable oil
- ⅔ cup whole milk
- 3 large eggs
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
Buttercream
- 2 cups unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 4 cups powdered sugar
- 1 tbsp meringue powder
- ⅛ - ¼ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- ¼ tsp ground ginger
- ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
- ¼ tsp ground cloves
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
Crumble
- 1 cup crumbled cinnamon sugar cookies
- 2 tbsp apple cider concentrate
Instructions
Apple Pie Filling
- Peel and core the apples, then chop them into 1/2 inch pieces.
- In a saucepan, combine the apples with the lemon juice, water, brown sugar and spices. Cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until the apples are very soft and the liquid is nearly evaporated.
- Let the apple filling cool slightly, then transfer to a container and refrigerate until well chilled. You can make and chill the apple filling up to 3 days in advance.
Cake
- Preheat the oven to 350 F, and spray the bottoms of four 8-inch cake pans with non-stick baking spray.
- In a bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, salt and spices.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together all of the remaining liquid ingredients.
- Add the dry ingredients to the liquid ingredients and whisk until combined, then divide the batter evenly between the four pans.
- Bake the cakes on the center oven rack for about 20-25 minutes, until the tops spring back when lightly touched and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Set the pans on a cooling rack, covered loosely with a clean kitchen towel, and cool completely before frosting.
Buttercream
- In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat the butter for 1 minute until smooth.
- In a separate bowl, combine the powdered sugar, meringue powder, salt and spices. With the mixer on low, add the powdered sugar mixture by spoonfuls, until combined. It will still be clumpy. Add the vanilla extract.
- Increase the speed to medium (#4/6 on a Kitchen Aid mixer), and whip for 4-5 minutes, scraping the bowl several times, until light and fluffy. During colder weather, you may need to add several tablespoons of milk if the buttercream seems too stiff.
Assembly
- Before assembling your cake, strain any excess liquid from the apple filling through a mesh strainer, to ensure it doesn't turn your buttercream soupy.
- To assemble the cake, start by placing one of the cake layers on a cake board or cake pedestal. Spread with a thin layer of buttercream, then spread or pipe a "dam" of buttercream around the edge. (The dam of buttercream will hold the apple filling in place.) Spread 1/3 of the apple filling onto the cake, and spread it out evenly so the next cake layer can sit flat on top.
- Repeat stacking and filling the rest of the cake layers with buttercream and apple filling, then place the fourth cake layer on top. Frost the cake all over with a thin crumb coat of buttercream. Chill the cake for 30 minutes to set the crumb coat.
- After chilling the crumb coat, frost the cake all over with a final coat of buttercream (or leave the cake semi-naked, as pictured in today's post).
- Pile the crumbled cinnamon sugar cookies on top of the cake. Just before serving, drizzle with apple cider concentrate.
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!
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