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Apple Crumb Cake

Apple crumb cake or apfelstreuselkuchen is a thin yellow cake with a thin layer of sliced apples and streusel on top. It is somewhat similar to apple crisp or apple cobbler, except that the base is a cake. The flavor is mostly egg and butter, with a hint of vanilla; the strong cinnamon or mixed-spice flavors characteristic of US apple dishes are absent. To serve it, cut the cake into squares. Serve warm or at room temperature with coffee or hot tea. Optionally, add vanilla ice cream or whipped cream. This sheet cake can be made the day before and travels well, which makes it a good choice for

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Ingredients 14 ingredients

  1. colspan="4" style="text-align: center; background: #f5f5f5;;" |Streusel
  2. ¾ cup / 175 g Butter, cold
  3. ½ cup / 125 g White granulated sugar
  4. 1 tsp (5 ml) / 2.5 g Cinnamon
  5. 2 cups / 250 g All-purpose flour
  6. colspan="4" style="text-align: center; background: #f5f5f5;;" |Filling
  7. 3–4 ea. Large apples
  8. colspan="4" style="text-align: center; background: #f5f5f5;;" |Cake
  9. 1¼ cups / 300 g Butter, slightly softened
  10. 1¼ cups / 300 g White granulated sugar
  11. 1 Tbsp (15 ml) Vanilla extract
  12. 6 ea. Eggs, at room temperature
  13. 1 tsp (5 ml) Baking powder
  14. 4¼ cups / 500 g All-purpose flour

Cook safely

Keep children and pets away from the hob and the oven, and keep oven gloves and a lid within reach.

  • Oven and hot trays. Use dry oven gloves for trays and dishes: a hot tray looks just like a cold one. Open the oven door away from your face and let the first rush of heat out.
  • Hot sugar. Hot sugar sticks to skin and burns far hotter than boiling water: don't touch or taste it. Keep a bowl of cold water close, and keep children away while it cooks.
  • Blending hot liquid. Let it cool a little first, fill the blender no more than a third, and hold the lid down with a folded towel. Start on the lowest speed. A stick blender in the pan is safer.
  • Sharp knives. Cut on a board that doesn't slip (a damp cloth under it helps), and curl the fingers of the hand that holds the food.

Method

  1. Use a pastry blender or a dinner knife to slice the 6 oz butter into pats. This step works best if the butter is cold.
  2. Combine the sugar, cinnamon, and flour into a mixing bowl. Stir the dry ingredients briefly to mix.
  3. Put the butter pieces into the bowl with the dry ingredients, and toss until the flour mixture has coated the pieces of butter.
  4. Use a pastry blender (or a pair of dinner knives held side-by-side in the same hand) to cut the flour-coated butter into the dry ingredients. Stop when all the butter is smaller than a green pea (about 1 cm in diameter), but you can still see lumps of butter.
  5. Set aside. This mixture can be covered and stored in the refrigerator for several days if necessary.
  6. Peel and core the apples.
  7. Cut the apples into quarters, then cut each quarter into thin slices. You will need enough slices to make a single layer over the top of the cake.
  8. Set aside. As the apples will be covered by streusel topping, it doesn't matter if they turn a little brown while you make the cake batter.
  9. Beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. This step works best if the butter is slightly softened.
  10. Beat in the vanilla and eggs, one at a time. Scrape the bottom of the bowl after beating in each egg.
  11. Stir in the baking powder and flour.
  12. Preheat oven to 350 °F (180 °C / gas mark 4 / moderate oven).
  13. Optionally, line the pan(s) with parchment baking paper. Do not grease or flour the cake pan.
  14. Spread the cake batter into the prepared pan.
  15. Arrange a single layer of apple slices on top of the cake batter. Apples should cover the cake batter as much as possible, out to the edges of the pan. If you have enough apple slices and you want more apple in your cake, then it's okay to overlap them a little.
  16. Sprinkle the streusel mixture on top of the apples. It should generously cover all of the apples.
  17. Bake at 350 °F (190 °C) for about 40 minutes, until the apples are soft, the cake is cooked through, and the streusel is golden brown.

Plating

Cookware for this recipe

  • Cake tin
  • Mixing bowl
  • Blender
  • Chef's knife
  • Cutting board
  • Vegetable peeler
  • Wooden spoon
Source CC-BY-SA-4.0
Credit

"Apple Crumb Cake" from the Wikibooks Cookbook (https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cookbook:Apple_Crumb_Cake, revision 4658347), by its contributors (https://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?title=Cookbook:Apple_Crumb_Cake&action=history), licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).

Revision 4658347

What was changed: Reformatted by FoodByNation from the wiki page: ingredients and steps extracted, links and templates removed, diet notes detected from the ingredients. This adaptation is also licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.