I made this cake because I wanted to bake something using some of the gorgeous fall apples that are coming into season.
This post also coincides with National Apple Dumpling Day, which is September 17.
I’m also participating in Apple Week with a dozen other bloggers this week.
We’re all posting at least one new apple recipe this week on our blogs and this is my contribution for the week.
The cake also does double duty for my Banana Bread Fest series, my fourth banana bread recipe. Technically though, it’s not really banana bread.
It’s definitely more cake-like than bread-like, lighter and with a more delicate crumb and an airier texture than banana bread. However, the banana, in addition to the yogurt incorporated into the cake batter, really helps to keep it moist, soft, and tender.
The cake’s favor leans much more toward apple than banana, and the spices I used including cinnamon, ginger, pumpkin pie spice, nutmeg, and cloves accentuate and complement the flavor of the apples.
If you don’t keep all of those spices on hand, don’t worry about it and use what you do have.
I mixed up the batter by hand with a whisk, in one big bowl, by melting some butter, adding a little oil, sugar, eggs, yogurt, spices and whisking. After folding in some diced apples, mashed banana, and flour, the batter was ready in no time.
The selling point of this cake is not how easy it is to make or how the bits of apples in each bite are like little fruit surprises with a great chewy texture.
The selling point is the glaze.
I have made hundreds and hundreds of batches of glaze and frosting in my life and this vanilla caramel glaze is my number one favorite frosting or glaze, ever. It even surpasses chocolate-peanut butter buttercream and it’s hard to compete with chocolate + peanut butter + butter, but this glaze is my kryptonite.
If you like caramels, you’ll love it. It’s buttery, caramely, rich, smooth, decadent, sweet, and full of robust vanilla flavor. At room temperature, it stays soft and although it will set up and crystallize a tiny bit over time, it stays satiny and smooth.
Imagine biting into the creamiest, richest, most intense caramel that’s ever passed your lips, then infusing it with cream, sugar and vanilla, and then glazing a cake with it.
That’s what we have here and it makes store-bought jarred caramel sauce look like a pathetic excuse of a brown runny syrup that you’ll never be able to look at in quite the same way.
This recipe makes a generous-sized Bundt cake and since we didn’t need an entire cake just laying around, I sent half the cake with Scott, who was going back to his office after dinner to get some work done. He put out the cake at 9pm and apparently others in the building who were also working late had a case of the midnight munchies because he said that when went back into the breakroom a little after midnight, the entire cake was gone.
I guess they liked it.
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Spiced Apple and Banana Bundt Cake with Vanilla Caramel Glaze
Ingredients
Cake
- ¼ cup unsalted butter, melted
- ¼ cup canola or vegetable oil
- 5 ½ ounces vanilla or plain yogurt, one standard-sized small container; Greek yogurt is preferred, sour cream may be substituted
- 2 large eggs
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- ¼ cup light brown sugar, packed
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- ½ teaspoon cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon ground ginger
- ¼ teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
- ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
- ¼ teaspoon ground cloves
- 1 cup mashed ripe bananas, about 1 1/2 large bananas
- 1 cup finely diced apples, 1 medium apple; I used one unpeeled Gala apple
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt, optional and to taste
Vanilla Caramel Glaze
- Makes about 1 cup glaze, enough to generously glaze the cake
- ¼ cup unsalted butter, melted (half of 1 stick)
- ⅓ cup light brown sugar, packed
- 2 tablespoons cream or milk
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 1 ½ to 2 cups+ confectioners’ sugar, sifted (must be sifted)
Instructions
Cake
- Preheat oven to 350F and spray a 12-cup Bundt cake pan or tube cake pan very well with cooking spray (I usePam For Baking with Flour and it worked so well for me that this cake literally fell out of the pan while I was beginning to inverting it before I was properly set up to catch the cake on a cutting board) or grease and flour the pan; set aside.
- In a large microwave-safe bowl, melt the butter, about 1 minute on high power. To the melted butter, add canola oil, yogurt, eggs, sugars, vanilla, cinnamon, ginger, pumpkin pie spice, nutmeg, cloves (all spices should be added to taste and if you don’t have all of them on hand, not a big deal to omit some) and whisk until batter is smooth and silky, about 1 minute of vigorous whisking. Add the bananas, apples, and stir to combine. Add the flour, baking soda, salt, and stir until just combined, taking care not to over-mix and over-develop the gluten, which would result in a tougher cake. Pour batter into prepared pan and bake for about 39 to 43 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean (or insert a sharp long-blade chef’s knife and it should come out clean). Allow cake to cool in pan for at least 15 minutes before inverting it and removing cake.
- While cake is cooling, make the caramel sauce. Optionally, while cake is cooling poke approximately 25 holes in the top surface of the cake with a chopstick or popsicle stick. The holes will allow the glaze to seep into the cake’s interior, creating a delicious caramel-apple flavor; the drawback is that it’s not quite as pretty when sliced, but since you’re not likely going to take pictures of the cake’s interior surfaces, I’d poke the holes.
Vanilla Caramel Glaze
- Note: This is a fast moving recipe; have everything in place before you begin.
- In a small saucepan, melt the butter over medium-high heat. To the melted butter, add the brown sugar and bring to a boil, stirring nearly continuously. Allow the mixture to boil quite rapidly for 2 minutes, stirring nearly continuously. Remove the pan from the burner, allow it to cool for about 1 minute, and add the cream, taking caution because the mixture could bubble vigorously. Whisk aggressively to incorporate the cream and calm the bubbling.
- After the bubbling has subsided, add the vanilla and whisk to combine, using caution because the alcohol in the extract could cause the mixture to bubble up again. Add the confectioners’ sugar one-half cup at a time, until desired sauce consistency is reached (I absolutely recommend using sifted sugar so the glaze is whisks up smooth, silky, and free from lumps). Pour glaze over cake and allow it to set up for a few minutes if desired; or slice and serve immediately. Cake will keep for up to 5 days in an airtight container at room temperature. If there is extra unused glaze, it can be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 1 month; gently reheat it in the microwave prior to glazing another dessert.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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Related Recipes
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Spiced Apple Pie Smoothie (vegan, GF)
Banana Bread with Vanilla Browned Butter Glaze – Week 1 of Banana Bread Fest
Zucchini Banana Bread with Browned Butter Cream Cheese Frosting – Week 2 of Banana Bread Fest
Pumpkin Banana Bread with Browned Butter Cream Cheese Frosting – Week 3 of Banana Bread Fest
Do you have any favorite apple recipes?
Feel free to link up your favorite apple recipes
Check out these ladies’ blogs this week for their apple recipes
Thanks for the Cooking With Trader Joe’s Cookbook Giveaway entries and have a great week!
Oh Averie, this cake looks fantastic. What a delicious way to enjoy Fall and its wonderful apple bounty!
This looks fabulous, great use of apples and a gorgeous fall-themed recipe! Apples seem to be my theme lately too since our tree is exploding with them and that’s not a bad thing! :-) I like pretty much anything that’s apple cinnamon flavor.
Oh. My. Goodness. It’s like you made this cake just for me! :) These are really some of my favorite flavors and I cannot wait to make this! That glaze looks unbelievable.
Thanks, Shannon. Lmk if you end up trying it!
What a beautiful dessert! I love baking with cloves; they bring amazing flavor that I find complements many fruits. I know that I would love that glaze. My Dad takes all of my leftovers to work and they are gone in no time, even ones that I don’t think are the best they can’t stop talking about.
I was just pre-writing another post last night and wrote that I love baking with cloves too and and I need to use them more often, not just in the fall!
YUM! I am sold on just about anything “spiced,” especially in bundt form. I can’t help but giggle everytime I see a bundt cake because I think, “There’s a hole in this cake.” Haha.
I grew up with Bundts! My mom always made them much more than sheet cakes so they’re childhood to me.
Hi Averie. Your cakes and breads are looking amazing lately. I think you’ve got something here. I love bundt cakes, they are just so fun to make and top that with a carmel glaze, yum! Zoe has the day off tomorrow so maybe we will bake up one of these to celebrate fall. You did a great job with topping the glaze. That is one of the hardest parts for me. Great recipe yet again girl!
xoxo,
Jackie
Thanks, Jackie! I decided after reading my own archives and making more from-scratch cakes that I am taking a cake-mix-cake break. And I’m loving it. The glazes…I have decided that you can go artful and slightly messy OR it has to be perfectly applied to look good. And there is no way I can do ‘perfectly applied’ so it’s gotta be the former :)
My mouth is watering! This cake looks phenomenal. I definitely want to participate in the great apple bake-off and make this, namely for that ridiculous glaze. I kinda want to just eat that with a spoon:)
And I DO eat it with a spoon…it’s that good. I like a little cake with my frosting :)
This is gorgeous, I think I could just drink that glaze!!
Oh, and I do. Quick, hide the spoons! lol
Wow…that looks incredible! I have been looking for apple recipes all week to make for the start of the sweet new year. I will have to save this one for my next fall party!
Well there are tons of apple recipes that I’ve seen sneak peaks of on all those ladies’ blogs, too, that I linked coming up so you’re in business!
Mmmmmm. That would be just about perfect with my morning cup of coffee. Love the idea of co-mingling bananas and apples, and that glaze really does look over-the-top delicious.
As a Washingtonian, I am extra super excited for apple season. Every year we drive over the mountains and bring back boxes and boxes of fresh-picked apples and then I set about destroying my kitchen making more applesauce and apple butter than our family of three can possibly eat over the winter.
These last couple of days, though, I’ve been craving hot spiced apple cider. Might have to brew some of that up in the Crock Pot today. Cheers to fall!
crock pot apple cider, applesauce, and apple butter all sound SO good to me!
Averie, this looks scrumptious! Love the glaze…. I want to eat a bowl of it!
This looks fabulous Averie!! That glaze is very similar to mine, YUMMERs.
Oh I can’t wait to see the post!
This sounds like a very yummy cake and glaze. Looking to make apple cupcakes next week. The planned caramel topping might just have to be substituted with your glaze recipe :)
Oh LMK if you try it. You will not be disappointed!
So as planned I made the glaze for my apple cupcakes here https://specialtycakecreations.com/apple
I only had dark brown sugar available, so the glaze is a little darker too but it worked really great with these cupcakes. Thanks for the recipe :)
So glad that you enjoyed it and your cupcakes turned out beautifully and as I said about the brown sugar, when caramelizing anything, you’re really just turning it darker so in this case, starting with dark brown sugar was just fine anyway. I call for light in the glaze because I called for light in the cake and figured why have two diff types for some folks who may not ordinarily keep both types on hand but for the glaze, dark sounds lovely.
Another one in love with that glaze, I bet it works so well with all the fall flavours of the cake.
It totally does. Works a little too well :)
The glaze does sound pretty amazing! My mom makes the best apple cake, but never with glaze. I might have to drop the suggestion. ;) I have an apple recipe this week, too! ‘Tis the season. I must stop eating all the apples, though. How can I cook with them?!
Your mom sounds like an amazing cook! I would love to try her apple cake!! And your apple recipes!
I’m definitely loving the easiness of this and that decadent glaze! I may have to make this for Jason’s family – it’ll get my some major brownie points with his mom!
EASINESS…yes. When I see cakes that call for 6 eggs, separated. Cake flour, creaming things in mixers, I immediately tune out…Lol