Caramel Apple Cake with Apple Cider Frosting is to die for. Really. It’s time to crank out those delicious fall recipes! And since now you can find apple cider pretty easily at the store this is a great time to make this fantastic cake recipe. This would also be great for holiday baking. The luscious tastes of apples and caramels make this an amazing treat for your family or company.

Follow Me On Instagram!

This delicious apple cake is extra moist because it has canola oil, applesauce, buttermilk, and caramel sauce in the cake batter. Then it has a delicious butter cream  frosting with apple cider and cinnamon to give it an extra added goodness. You will love this cake recipe! Our guests oohed and awed over it yesterday.

I found the recipe at Painting with Eggs but this recipe is adapted from Whole Foods Market. I went back to the original recipe to compare the two. I have adapted the original recipe slightly and incorporated a few ideas from Painting with Eggs as well.

It is a fantastic recipe but one of the main changes I made was to put this recipe in THREE baking pans. I recommend you do the same. This is too much batter for two cake pans. I knew from looking at the batter that this would overflow and spill out into my oven if I stayed with 2 baking pans.

Since I was having company I didn’t want my house smelling like that yucky burnt-smoky smell from spills in the oven! I’m sure glad I baked it in three pans because they came to the top while baking. Two pans would have been a real mess.

If you want a caramel apple taste in a cake, this Caramel Apple Cake with Apple Cider Frosting is a sure bet. Everyone in our family and our guests loved it.

When I first made this recipe in November 2012, I loved the cake but wasn’t happy with my pictures. I was still new to the blogging world and I wasn’t using a good camera. I recently remade this rich and decadent cake again for company (December 2014), and took some new pictures so you can enjoy this luscious and lovely cake. Enjoy.

Caramel Apple Cake with Apple Cider Frosting is simply A-M-A-Z-I-N-G!

Caramel Apple Cake with Apple Cider Frosting is rich, decadent, amazing!

We drizzled more caramel sauce over top of the cake so it was incredibly sweet.

Caramel Apple Cake with Apple Cider Frosting can’t be beat!

Here’s what I did.

I used these ingredients for the cake batter.

Place oil in a large mixing bowl. Add brown sugar, applesauce, eggs, cinnamon, salt, baking powder, baking soda and vanilla.

Add caramel sauce.

Add buttermilk. 

If you don’t have buttermilk, measure regular milk into 2-cup measuring cup and add 2-3 tbsp. apple cider vinegar, regular vinegar, or lemon juice. Allow milk to stand about 5 minutes until curdled. Add to mixing bowl with other ingredients. Don’t be surprised if you see foaming where the baking soda and buttermilk meet. It’s supposed to do this. Buttermilk or soured milk will activate baking soda in recipes. 

Mix all ingredients together with an electric mixer. Mixture will be very thin.

Add whole wheat flour and UNBLEACHED all-purpose flour. Bleached flours toughens cakes and cookies.

Stir all ingredients together with a wooden spoon. This makes a thin batter, but a lot of it. That’s why I chose to place this in three greased and floured cake pans. I knew with the amount of leavening ingredients this would raise considerably and I would have spills all over the bottom of my oven. I’m glad I made this in three pans because even with the extra pan the ingredients raised to the top of the pan.

Grease three 9″ cake pans. Really use a lot of Crisco to make sure the pans are well-covered. Add flour to pan and shake back and forth (like gold miners sluicing for gold) to cover the bottom. Then rotate the pan until the flour totally covers the sides of the pans. Add more flour if necessary to get good coverage. Spread cake batter evenly among the three baking pans.

Bake cakes at 350 for about 30-40 minutes. Insert toothpick in center. If it comes out clean and not goopy, the cake is done.

I used these ingredients to make the frosting.

While cake is cooling, make frosting. Put softened butter in large mixing bowl. Add apple cider and cinnamon and a “dash” of salt.

Add powdered sugar. Beat with an electric mixer until well mixed. 

Allow cakes to cool completely. Invert one of the cake pans onto a plate. Add about a cup of frosting and smooth over the top.

Add the second cake layer. Secure with toothpicks. I place them every two-three inches around the outer edge and 1 in the center. (This will keep the cake layers from shifting). Push the toothpicks down into the cake so that the top of the toothpick is under the top of the cake. Add about a cup of frosting over top of the second layer.

Add third cake layer. Secure this layer with toothpicks to the second layer. Use remaining frosting to frost the top and sides of cake.

Decorate cake with pecans and additional caramel sauce, as desired.

Caramel Apple Cake with Apple Cider Frosting is to die for! It tastes like caramel apples in cake form. Yum.

This cake is so rich, decadent and amazing!

Drizzling caramel sauce over the top makes this even better!

Here’s the recipe.

CARAMEL APPLE CAKE WITH APPLE CIDER FROSTING

(Recipe adapted from SimplyFineLiving source: Whole Foods Market)

This cake turned out fantastic. Everyone raved over it.

Caramel Apple Cake with Apple Cider Frosting is a great cake for fall or holiday baking.

This cake turned out wonderfully with amazing flavors.

Caramel Apple Cake with Apple Cider Frosting is divine!

You may also enjoy these delicious recipes!

Apple Cake

Apple Dapple Cake

Apple Cranberry Dump Cake Cobbler