Prep Time20 minutes
Total Time1 hour 40 minutes
Servings16 Servings
Pumpkin Apple Cake is a super simple and moist recipe. Chunks of tart apples marry perfectly with a pumpkin spice cake. You just need a light dusting of powdered sugar to finish it off.
This spiced apple cake is perfect, in my opinion. It’s not too sweet, only requires a slight dusting of powdered sugar and would be perfect for your Thanksgiving dessert table.
Ingredients you’ll need to make this cake
- Unsalted butter
- All-purpose flour
- Wheat germ
- Baking powder and Baking soda
- Salt
- Spices: ground cinnamon, grated nutmeg, ground cloves, ground ginger
- Granulated sugar
- Dark brown sugar
- Eggs, large
- Vanilla extract
- Pumpkin puree
- Granny Smith apples
- Chopped walnuts, optional
- Confectioners’ sugar
I wanted to make a moist cake and nothing makes a cake more spongy and luscious than adding pumpkin puree. Big chunks of apple and loads of spices make this Pumpkin Apple Cake really delicious. All it needs is a quick dusting of powdered sugar just before serving. Make this for your next brunch or holiday dinner party.
Pumpkin Apple Cake Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 cups all purpose flour, plus more for dusting cake pans
- ½ cup wheat germ
- 1 tsp baking powder
- ¾ tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp kosher salt
- ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
- ¼ tsp ground cloves
- ¼ tsp ground ginger
- 8 tbsp salted butter, 1 stick, room temperature, plus more for cake pans
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- ½ cup dark brown sugar, firmly packed
- 2 large eggs, room temperature
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup pumpkin puree, not pumpkin pie filling
- 2 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and cut into 1/2-inch dice (2 cups)
- ½ cup walnuts, coarsely chopped
- powdered sugar, for dusting
Instructions
- Position the oven rack in the center of the oven and preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly butter and flour a 9 inch fluted or plain tube pan and tap out the excess flour.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, wheat germ, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and ginger. In a large bowl, beat the butter with an electric mixer set on high speed until creamy, about 1 minute. Gradually beat in the granulated and brown sugars and beat until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. One at a time, beat in the eggs, followed by the vanilla, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. Add the pumpkin and beat until combined. Add the apples and walnuts. With the mixer set on low speed, min in the flour mixture in thirds, scraping down the bowl as needed. Spread the batter in the prepared pan.
- Bake until the cake is golden brown and a long bamboo skewer inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean, about 1 hour. Let cool in the pan on a wire cooling rack for 15 minutes. Invert the cake onto the wire rack and unmold. Turn right side up and cool completely.
- To serve, sift confectioners’ sugar over the top and cut into wedges
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Nutrition
*Nutritional information is not guaranteed to be accurate.
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Hi! I’m Heather
I’m Heather, a recipe developer and content creator based in Vancouver, Washington. I started Farmgirl Gourmet in 2006 because I believed weeknight dinners shouldn’t be boring and gourmet shouldn’t mean complicated. I’m also the co-founder of Spiceology, so safe to say I think about food for a living. Stick around for recipes that actually make it into your regular rotation.
Can you leave out the wheat germ?
Absolutely. Just add 1/2 cup more all purpose flour. ~heather
I really love this recipe and hope you will too!
cookies
Brownies are my favorite, the dense, fudgy, dark chocolate kind. 🙂
Looks amazing and delicious!! I would love to try some tonight. Thanks for sharing 🙂
With nutmeg, cloves and ginger, this is bound to be a perfect cake for fall. I’d love a slice with a cup of tea.
It was really delish…only bad thing was that I only got a small piece. Wait, maybe that’s not such a bad thing. 🙂 Thanks for commenting Dara!
Cookies of all types “)
Yes, please.
Cookies ! Can’t wait to try the cake !
yum, this bread recipe looks great. Perfect for this time of year 🙂
I love a good, chewy cookie but wouldn’t turn down a brownie, either!
I love, love, love brownies and the gooyier the better!
my favorite cookie recipe
Brownies!!! With frosting – and nuts – and chocolate chips – and caramel. 😀
I have a cookie addiction. Seriously.
I love a moist chewy brownie especially when there is frosting.
Love some chewy soft chocolate chip cookies!
Wow! That looks absolutely amazing!
I love chewy fudgy brownies
definitely cookies
Cookies for sure! Especially pecan fingers.
If I had to choose it would be cookies and I love the good milk dunkin kind!
dark chocolate brownies
Brownies!
Gorgeous as always! I envy your photography skills, but you knew that already. I love this cookbook, it is a wonderful addition to my collection!
Pumpkins and Apples….we grow them both and have them in stock!
Can’t wait to try your cake, it looks delicious!
I would have to go with brownies, the cake looks amazing too!
I love cookies. We used to bake around 20 kinds of cookies for the holidays and my favorite were the ones with the hickory nuts from our front yard.
My favorite treat is cookies! Especially oatmeal chocolate chip.
This recipe looks delicious! Fall flavors for sure.
I love both cookies and brownies!
Cookies are my favorite and your cake looks really good!
What’s a good substitute for wheat germ?
How about Bran? Or you could use whole wheat flour, but it make make the cake more dense. You can’t even tell the wheat germ is in the cake.
The pics you posted yesterday got me. It looks so yummy. My favorite sweet treat is a cookie, though it’s hard to turn down a good brownie.
Looks amazingly delicious! Perfect for a Halloween Evening!
So I still do get a feed…. That looks so yummy! Hope you are doing better…take care.
What a great combination of flavors. It looks scrumptious!
This sounds delicious