Apple Snack Cake

It’s fall and picking apples – or at least eating apples – is on the minds of many of us. Apples work in all kinds of recipes, and not all are sweet.

But let’s face it, that’s where most of us go when it comes to this fruit, right?

It’s good whenever you want to eat it. It’s an all-occasion thing – hence a snack cake.

An apple snack cake for collectors and everyone else

This recipe is from us The fruit collector’s companion: ferments, desserts, entrees and more from your neighborhood and beyond (Chelsea Green, 2018) by Simply Recipes contributor Sara Bir.

Bir’s book comes to life with her outstanding fruit research, funny anecdotes and a keen eye for detail. It’s full of recipes that are both familiar and a little unorthodox – things like jams, relishes and compotes, along with scones, salads, pies and pizza.

The snack cake we’re featuring here is full of recognizable comfort, but have you ever worked with mayhaws, sumac, or Bir’s favorite fruit, and arguably the entry-level fruit for this whole topic — papayas? The book offers enough accessible and complementary recipes for those who are truly culinary curious.

The gift of this book is the way it sees the potential we have to feed ourselves right in our backyards.

Foraging: Easier than thought

Sara spends much of her free time during the growing season looking for things that others miss. There is an abundance of food in our backyards, woods, parks, roadsides, etc. – and you don’t even need to be an expert.

She says it’s just about becoming familiar with what’s around you — and that doesn’t necessarily mean just the edibles in your backyard or local park.

It also means “poking around” at the farmers’ market, discovering seasonal foods or looking out for new foods you’ve never seen before and asking the farmers questions about them. It’s a practice of mindfulness. And something she jokingly refers to as “eyeball questing” — you kind of just look at things as you walk.

The idea of ​​foraging sounds somehow esoteric or difficult, but it is not. That’s really the fancy way of saying, that’s how we used to eat. And it doesn’t require much knowledge – really just a sense of curiosity about what’s growing around us and how that changes with the seasons.

A triple apple flavored snack cake

Recipes often work well because there is a layering of flavors. In this case, the snack cake contains apples in triplicate: applesauce, cider, and apple chunks. The applesauce adds moisture, the cider concentrates flavor, and the apples add texture.

Which apples to use for this snack cake

I used Pink Ladies and Honeycrisp apples in this recipe, but feel free to use whatever you can find when you pick them.

Or maybe you have friends with apple trees. When I ask Sara what kind of apples she likes to use for this recipe, she says, “You can find the ones that are free.” Of course! What else would a collector say?

All in all, however, you might be just as lucky as me to find a local orchard that also produces cider and applesauce that you can use in this recipe and will no doubt produce a more interesting apple flavor.

Or you can go all out and make your own cider or applesauce; Sara provides recipes for both in her book.

For more information on which apple varieties are best for baking, check out our guide to apples.

What else you can look for and make from this cookbook

I also plan to make the citrus curd out of this The Fruit Gatherer’s Companionthat calls for lemon, orange, or lime. I think I’ll use them all. I don’t live in California or anywhere that citrus grows, so my citrus quest will be the grocery store for this one.

We’re also in pear season right now and I’m fishing to make the arugula pear almond pizza. Or maybe the Italian plum cake. Oh forget it, they all look delicious!

Sara’s favorite hidden gem from the book is something called the Old Sour, a condiment well known in the Florida Keys. It’s basically a brine that you make from limes that you add spicy peppers to and then you bottle and let the whole thing ferment.

It’s salty, lemony, and flavorful, just as good with sautéed veggies like corn or zucchini, and even in “taco situations,” she says. Southeast Asian foods would benefit. “It has a bright heat with sharp top notes and the citrus notes are deeper – almost like a citrus candy,” she explains. In other words, it dissolves quickly.

More snack cake recipes!

• German Chocolate Snack Cake with Coconut Pecan Frosting
• Texas Layer Cake
• Yoghurt Cake
• Snip Doodles (Snickerdoodle coffee cakes)
• Banana sheet cake