Apple Pie Cake Recipe (Romanian Apple Cake)
Soft and moist apple pie cake with a light sponge and a sweet cinnamon apple filling. This layered cake recipe is incredibly easy to make and only uses one tray. Quick to make and delicious served with ice cream or vanilla custard.
Equipment
- 11 x 9 inch rectangular tray / 12 inch round tray
Ingredients
Cake sponge
- 200 g plain flour (1 ⅔ cups)
- 10 g baking powder (2 tsp)
- 140 g sugar (⅔ cup)
- 2 eggs, large
- 2 egg yolks, large
- 125 g melted butter, cooled (½ cup)
- 100 ml milk, warm (⅓ cup)
- 30 g sour cream (2 tbsp)
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
- ¼ teaspoon cardamom
- ¼ teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 lemon zest
Apple filling
- 1.5 kg sweet apples (6-7 medium apples)
- 50 g sugar (¼ cup)
- 1 tablespoon cinnamon
Instructions
- Peel and core the apples, then grate them using a large box grater or food processor. I prefer the food processor as it’s much quicker. Combine the apples with the cinnamon and sugar. Optional: you can also add in chopped walnuts for extra crunch.
- Pre-heat the oven to 180C (360F) with fan. Prepare your baking tray by lining it with baking paper and greasing with butter. Make sure you use a larger sheet of baking paper so you can easily remove the cake from the tray.
- In a large bowl, beat the eggs and sugar until light and pale. Add in the melted butter that has been cooled down to room temperature, as well as the warm milk, sour cream and lemon zest. Mix well to incorporate.
- Separately, combine the flour, baking powder, salt and spices. Add the dry ingredients over the wet, folding them in with a spatula. Do not over-mix to avoid making a dense batter.
- Pour half of the batter into the lined baking tray, then bake for 15-20 minutes until it turns golden and firm. Use a toothpick or skewer to check if it's cooked.
- Once the bottom layer has baked, place the raw grated apples on top, in an even layer. Even out the layer with a spatula or knife, then pour the remaining batter on top of the apples. Bake the apple cake for 35-40 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean. Check at the 25 minute mark, and if the top layer begins to brown too much, cover it with aluminium foil.
- Let the apple tray bake cool down for 30 minutes, then take it out of the tray and slice it. For serving, you can either dust it with icing sugar and cinnamon or serve it with warm custard or vanilla ice cream – YUM!
Notes
- I recommend using a kitchen scale in grams for more accuracy. The cups used for the conversion are standard US customary cups (1 cup flour = 136g). There are many different types of cups across the globe, which is why I strongly recommend using grams instead.
Nutrition
Calories: 243kcal
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!