Apple Crumb Cake is soft vanilla butter cake with a cinnamon crumble topping and tart yummy apple chunks inside. It’s the perfect cake. Not too sweet, not dry at all. Full of flavor. This is the kind of cake you want to make again and again.
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Fall season
Fall is my favorite season! The cooler mornings. The crisp air. The yummy foods! I mean, I love soups, stews, cakes, pumpkin flavors, all those things that evoke fall thoughts.
And, of course football is back, which you know I love!
I’m very excited to bring you some amazing apple recipes from some of my friends, including my Apple Crumb Cake! We thought we’d get together and make up some apple treats to help celebrate the season.
When my friends were talking about making an apple recipe to help celebrate fall, I knew I was in! Make sure to scroll all the way down to see all the amazing apple recipes! I’m not sure which one I’ll make first!
Recipe attempts
I actually made a different cake for my first attempt at this apple recipe share. It was a yeasted coffee cake, and I actually messed it up by putting too much sugar in it, so it didn’t rise. In the end, it’s just fine that I messed it up, though. See, it took 3 hours to rise. 3 hours! And, to be quite honest, I know that no one is going to go to all that trouble! Who has that kind of time?
So, I decided to start again with a different recipe, one that doesn’t require any rising time. And, it turned out so yummy!
This Apple Crumb Cake is based off of an America’s Test Kitchen recipe. And, it’s really good!
Recipe Notes
Don’t be tempted to substitute all-purpose flour for the cake flour in this Apple Crumb Cake, as doing so will make a dry, tough cake. The cake flour has less protein (gluten), and is therefore more tender.
Want to read more about the differences in flours, take a look at my Flour 101.
Also, be sure to use refrigerated buttermilk, not the powdered kind, as powdered buttermilk with make the cake flat, not fluffy.
You do not need to peel the apple for this recipe, but you can if you want.
Follow me on Pinterest
I have a board dedicated to all things fall – Autumn – Fall – Halloween Recipes + Crafts – over there! Come take a look.
More Apple Recipes
Check out all the other delicious APPLE recipes below from bloggers who took part in our 30 Day Apple Challenge.
- Easy Apple and Cranberry Roll Ups by Lovefoodies
- Old-Fashioned Apple Cake by The Kitchen is My Playground
- Overnight Apple Oatmeal with Praline Topping by Manila Spoon
- Apple Pie Cupcakes by Num’s the Word
- Apple Pecan Dump Cake by Blessed Beyond Crazy
- Homemade chocolate apples by Culinary Ginger
- Overnight Streusel Apple Cinnamon French Toast by Noshing With The Nolands
- Apple Crumb Cake by Life Currents
- Apple Fritter Cake by Who Needs A Cape?
- Slow Cooker Brown Sugar Sausage, Apples and Onions by Hot Eats and Cool Reads
- Caramel Apple Cobbler by Serena Bakes Simply From Scratch
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Apple Crumb Cake Recipe
Apple Crumb Cake
Ingredients
Crumb Topping
- 7 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 7 tablespoons dark brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/8 teaspoon table salt
- 12 tablespoons unsalted butter melted and still warm
- 2 ½ cups cake flour
- 1 large Granny Smith apple chopped
Cake
- 1 ¼ cups cake flour
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon table salt
- 6 tablespoons unsalted butter cut into 6 pieces, softened but still cool
- 1 large egg
- 1 large egg yolk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/3 cup buttermilk
Instructions
FOR THE TOPPING:
- Whisk sugars, cinnamon, salt, and butter in medium bowl to combine. Add flour and stir until mixture resembles thick, cohesive dough; set aside to cool to room temperature.
- Using both hands, break apart the crumb topping, rolling the broken dough between your thumb and forefinger to form crumbs about the size of large peas. Continue until all the dough has been broken down into crumbs. In a separate small bowl, take about 1 cup of the topping and mix it with the chopped apple. Set aside both bowls.
FOR THE CAKE:
- Adjust oven rack to upper-middle position and heat oven to 325 degrees F. Cut a 16-inch length parchment paper and fold lengthwise to 7-inch width. Spray an 8-inch square baking dish with nonstick cooking spray and fit the parchment into dish, pushing it into corners and up sides; allow excess to overhang edges of dish. This allows you to easily remove the cake from the pan once it’s baked.
- In a large bowl using a hand mixer, mix flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt on low speed to combine. Add butter to the dry ingredients one piece at a time; continue beating until mixture resembles moist crumbs, with no visible butter chunks remaining, about 1 to 2 minutes. Add egg, yolk, vanilla, and buttermilk; beat on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 1 minute, scraping once if necessary.
- Pour about half of the cake batter into the prepared baking pan. Sprinkle the 1 cup of crumb topping that has been mixed with the chopped apple on top of the cake batter. Pour remaining cake batter on top, and using a rubber spatula or offset spatula, spread batter into an even layer. Sprinkle remaining pea-sized pieces of crumb topping evenly over the cake batter beginning with edges and then working toward center.
- Bake until crumbs are golden and wooden skewer or toothpick inserted into center of cake comes out clean, 40 to 50 minutes. Cool on wire rack at least 30 minutes. Remove cake from pan by lifting parchment overhang.
This looks wonderful and that crumb is calling my name!
Looks like a great BREAKFAST to me!! Just pass me a fork, please. 🙂
Tracey @ The Kitchen is My Playground
Do you peel the apple?
Carolyn, you do not need to peel the apple for this recipe, but you can if you want to.
Carolyn, thanks for letting me know it’s on this recipe. The ability to quickly 2x the recipe was added long after I have published this recipe, and I’m attempting to go back and adjust the recipes that have this. I’ve updated it now to make it easier to 2x. It isn’t my favorite thing to list the ingredients as 7 tablespoons, but that’s the only way to get the 2x to work for the technology. Thanks again.