Pumpkin Spice in a Pumpkin Cake with Apples and Streusel

 I love to read recipes for cooking and baking, especially ones that are a bit different than what I usually make. Recently I found this seasonal pumpkin cake on a Substack called Zoe Bakes. It's not the most simple cake because you have to prepare the apples before you make the cake, including sautéing them in butter and then mixing the slices with cinnamon sugar with time allowed to let them cool. About half way through making the cake batter you remove some of the dry ingredient-butter mixture and turn that into the streusel before returning to the stand mixer and finishing the cake batter. It all gets layered into a springform pan and baked for an hour. Then the cake has to cool before you can remove the springform sides and serve the cake. So allow a lot of time for this cake and for cleaning up all the pans and bowls needed to make it.

That said, it really is an outstanding cake! As I usually do, I played around with it. I made oat flour out of rolled oats using the food processor that was going to get dirty anyway when I used it to slice the apples. I substituted the oat flour for 1/4 cup of the whole wheat flour...and used whole wheat golden flour from King Arthur Baking instead of whole wheat pastry flour. To keep the oat thing going, I added 1/4 cup rolled oats to the streusel along with 1/4 cup chopped walnuts. 

 The flavor of the streusel was wonderful! The dominant flavor was from the apples, but that may be because I added 1/4 teaspoon vanilla to them after I mixed them with the cinnamon and sugar. The least dominant flavor was the pumpkin because there were all the spice flavors and apple flavors and walnut flavor going on. That wasn't a problem because the slice of cake was delicious overall and the play of textures added to the enjoyment.

If you have a bit of extra time and some crisp Granny Smith apples, plus a half can of pumpkin puree, do make this cake. It reminds me of why I love the fall. Not only do we get crisp weather and beautiful fall color, but it's baking weather again!

Pumpkin Apple Cake

Ingredients

Sautéed Apples

• 3 tbsp unsalted butter
• 4 large Granny Smith apples peeled, quartered and cored, and thinly sliced
• 3 tbsp granulated sugar
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp vanilla

Streusel Topping and Cake

• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/4 cup oat flour (rolled oats ground fine in a food processor works well)
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
  1/2 cup unsalted butter softened
• 3 tbsp granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup rolled oats
• 1/4 cup chopped walnuts
• 2 tablespoons butter, melted and cooled
• 2 tsp pumpkin pie spice, divided
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 3/4 cup pumpkin puree
• 1/3 cup sour cream
• 2 large eggs

Instructions Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter and flour an 8-inch springform pan.

Sautéed Apples  Sauté the apples in the butter on medium heat, just until they start to soften. Remove from heat and add the sugar and cinnamon. Toss to combine. Set aside.

Cake In a stand mixer combine the flour, brown sugar and salt. Add the 1/2 cup butter and blend well.
Measure out 2/3 cup of the mixture into a separate bowl to combine, then add 1 1/2 tsp. of the pumpkin spices and mix to make the streusel. Add the 3 tablespoons sugar, oats, walnuts,  and melted butter to this separate bowl mix, blend and set the finished streusel aside.
Add the remaining 1/2 tsp pumpkin spice, the baking soda, pumpkin, sour cream and eggs to the flour mixture left remaining in your mixer. Blend until smooth, about 2 minutes.
Layer the cake batter, then the sautéed apples and finally sprinkle the streusel over the top.
Bake, uncovered, for about 1 hour. Allow to cool in the pan and then remove the springform. 

Family Food in Sperryville with N. Carolina BBQ and Maryland Oysters

Joe's brioch loaf

Any time our family gets together you can be sure that we will have good food!

The cooking part included more North Carolina BBQ brought by the sister traveling from South Carolina as she passed through that state, and fried Maryland oysters and stuffed ham, both obtained near my brother's Maryland home. Since we grew up with North Carolina BBQ, the group was thrilled to enjoy that the first night together. Since I was the first sibling to be the Friday night cook who had to bread and fry oysters for 10 when I was a teen, I was thrilled that my nephews breaded and my brother fried the oysters...I only had to sit and eat them! They were excellent and I'm including their recipe for Fried Oysters below.

Since this is a food blog, I have to include a couple more food references. The nephew who lives in the cabin, Joe, is also a professional baker and he works at Walker's bakery in Sperryville. In case you get there, he told me that Vice- President J.D. Vance apparently is quite taken with their Florentine cookies. We enjoyed a number of the bakery's delicious products, including scones, croissants, babka and quiche, plus amazing sourdough bread. Joe shared a number of their products with us, including a delicious Danish and the brioche bread shown at the top of this post. There is a link to Walker's Bakeshop website below at the bottom of the post, after the oyster recipe.

We also stopped at Central Coffee Roasters in Sperryville. You can taste at least a half dozen of their exceptional coffees. I'm particularly fond of the Eapresso 101, but every on I tried was delicious and full flavored. They really know their coffee and can help you find just the right coffee for you. It's a family owned and run business, but the hours are weekend-ish. I'll put info below the oyster recipe if you want to check these businesses out. The Central Coffee Roasters do mail order, too. There is a link to their website below at the bottom of the post, after the oyster recipe.

All too soon it was time to head back to the airport to fly west. I already miss my east coast family! It was a wonderful visit and I hope to do it again before too long now that I know I can go by myself and make it home in good shape.

Phil and the Pirates' Oysters

Drain the oysters. (This works for any amount of shucked oysters)

Prepare three bowls, the first with flour seasoned with ground pepper, enough to dredge the amount of oysters you have.  The second bowl has an egg wash in it (use milk in the egg wash instead of water), make it an eggy wash, not so much liquid.  The third bowl has unflavored bread crumbs.

Pick up an oyster, dredge it in flour, transfer to the egg wash, then transfer to bread crumbs. Coat completely.   Place oysters, once prepped, on a wax paper covered cookie sheet and let them sit as you heat the oil.

Don't let them sit for too long, Phil lets them sit for 15-20 minutes.

Pour canola oil or any vegetable oil in a cast iron skillet.  Make it about 2-3 inches deep.  Heat it up slowly and gradually until very hot, just shy of smoking. 

 
Put a small chunk of batter in when you think it's hot enough and the batter chunk should skitter about, not sink.

Fry.  In a large cast iron skillet, about six at a time.  Put them in at intervals so you don't cool the oil.  Take one out, put another one in as they cook.

Phil places a plate over a pot of simmering water and drains the oysters on this plate covered with paper towels.  That way they stay warm as you fry all the oysters.

Enjoy!  Enjoy with cocktail sauce, actually. 

Central Coffee Roasters of Sperryville, VA

  Walker's Bakeshop, Sperryville, VA