Every fall, we had apples falling off our tree…so my mom made lots of apple cake. This is a new recipe and it’s TASTY, easy, and looks pretty. It’s not so healthy yet (attempts at that coming later). 

Ingredients

• 4 apples
• 1 stick of butter 
• 1 cup of flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3 egg yolks
• 2 full eggs
• 2 tablespoons calvados, rye whiskey, brandy (whatever you have)
• 3/4 cup of brown sugar
• 1 cup of regular sugar
• 2 teaspoons of cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
• 1 teaspoon nutmeg
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 1/4 cup pecans

the method

Peel, core and chop the apples into thin slices. In a heavy skillet, add 1/4 cup of melted butter, the brown sugar, and 1/2 of the spices. Add some water and 1/2 of the rye whiskey and then toss in the apples. Let the apples cook.

Line a round cakepan with parchement.  Spray it with cooking spray. Sprinkle a small handful of sugar and swish around.

Separate 3 eggs–save hte whites for something else. Add 2 full eggs and 1 cup of sugar. beat. Add 1/4 cup of melted butter, vanilla, the rest of the calvados/whiskey, and the rest of the spices and stir.  Sift the flour and baking powder slowly into this mixture. stir. Spice the mixture to taste.

Preheat oven to 350

Line up 1/3 of the apples in a layer concentric circles in the cake pan.  Drizzle a little of the syrup from the pan on top.  Add 1/3 of the pecans in a circle on top of the apples. Add 1/2 of the batter on top. Add another layer of apples in a concentric circle. Top with pecans (try to put them in a different place than the first circle of pecans). Drizzle with a little more syrup. Add remaining 1/2 of the batter on top. Line up the final layer of apples.  Put the syrup from the apples back onto the stove and simmer until it thickens and set aside. (stir carefully or it will burn).

Bake for 45 minutes.  Cool for 10 mins and then invert onto a platter. peel off the parchament.