Applesauce Spice Cake With Brown Sugar Icing

Irmgard's Note:

This wonderful cake is from Canadian Living magazine.

• Total Time: 50 mins
• Prep Time: 15 mins
• Cook Time: 35 mins

Ingredients:

Servings: 12

Cake

• 3/4 cup butter, softened
• 1 1/2 cups brown sugar, packed
• 3 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon ground allspice
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1 1/2 cups unsweetened applesauce
• 1/3 cup buttermilk

Icing

• 1/3 cup butter
• 2/3 cup brown sugar, packed
• 2 tablespoons corn syrup
• 2 tablespoons milk
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 1/2 cups icing sugar, sifted

Directions:

1. For the cake, grease a 9" x 13" cake pan; line the bottom with parchment paper.
2. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, beat the butter with the brown sugar until fluffy; beat in the eggs, one at a time.
4. Beat in the vanilla.
5. In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, allspice and nutmeg.
6. Stir into the butter mixture alternately with the applesauce and buttermilk, making 3 additions of dry ingredients and 2 of wet.
7. Spread in the prepared pan.
8. Bake in the centre of a 350 degree F oven until the cake tester inserted in the centre comes out clean, about 35 minutes.
9. Let cool in the pan on a rack.
10. For the icing, melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat.
11. Add the brown sugar and corn syrup; bring to a boil, stirring constantly.
12. Boil just until blended, about 1 minute.
13. Remove from the heat.
14. Using a wooden spoon, stir the milk and vanilla into the butter mixture.
15. Again using a wooden spoon, beat in the icing sugar until smooth and spreadable; let cool for 1 minute.
16. Spread over the top of the cake just to the edge, letting the icing drizzle over slightly.

Reviews

[KunmingCook]

Made this for my family recently, and it was a huge hit! I made a few changes: used half the sugar (no one missed it), used half whole wheat flour (nobody noticed), added 1/2 t cloves with the other spices. Instead of icing, I just sprinkled cinnamon sugar across the top before baking. Moist, flavorful, and not too sweet.

[internetnut]

I gave this 4 stars. This cake and icing was so good. My family really enjoyed this cake. We think the spice flavor was a perfect blend. I followed the recipe just as described. I will make this again for sure. Thanks so much for posting a great recipe! Christine (internetnut)