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Applesauce cake, sliced, on a pedestal. It is topped with a caramel glaze and toffee bits.
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4.93 from 13 votes

Applesauce Cake

This ultra moist apple sauce cake is simple to make, and so delicious! This homemade bundt cake has wonderful spiced flavor and a heavenly caramel glaze.
Prep Time20 minutes
Cook Time45 minutes
Additional Time20 minutes
Course: Dessert
Cuisine: American
Servings: 15 servings

Ingredients

  • 8 oz Cream Cheese, softened (We use one package cream cheese, full fat)
  • 1 ½ sticks unsalted butter, softened (168g total)
  • 2 cups granulated sugar (400g)
  • 4 large eggs, room temperature (to save time you can warm them in a bowl of very warm water for 5 min)
  • 3 cups Cake Flour- see Notes for substitution (342g)
  • 1 teaspoon Baking powder (4g)
  • 1 ½ teaspoons Baking soda (7g)
  • ½ teaspoon Salt (3g)
  • 1 ½ teaspoons Apple Pie Spice (5g)
  • 1 ¼ cup Applesauce (312g)
  • 1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract (4g)
  • cup Vegetable oil (67g) we used canola oil

Topping

  • We added a sprinkling of toffee bits as a topping (We used Heath toffee bits)

Caramel Sauce

  • ½ stick unsalted butter (57g)
  • 1 cup light brown sugar (packed into measuring cup) (217g)
  • ½ cup heavy cream (126g)
  • ½ teaspoon salt (2g)
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract (4g)
  • 1 Tablespoon light corn syrup (18g)

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Grease and flour a tube pan or bundt pan. (Ours was a 15 cup pan with 12 cup baking capacity. This recipe makes 8 cups of batter.)
  • In a medium bowl, whisk the cake flour, apple pie spice, baking powder, baking soda, and salt for 30 seconds and set aside.
  • In another bowl combine the vegetable oil, applesauce, and vanilla extract. Set aside.
  • In the bowl of your mixer, add the butter, cream cheese and mix at medium speed until smooth.
  • Gradually add the sugar and mix at medium speed for 2-3 minutes.
  • Add the room temperature eggs one at a time, mixing after each until the egg yolk has blended.
  • With the mixer on low speed, alternately add the flour mixture and the applesauce mixture, beginning and ending with the flour mixture (We did 3 additions of the dry mixture, 2 additions of wet). Slightly increase the mixer speed just until combined.
  • Scoop the batter into the prepared bundt pan.
  • Bake at 325 degrees for 40-45 minutes.  Check your cake at about 40 minutes using a long wooden skewer or a toothpick to determine doneness.  Bake until the toothpick  comes out clean or with just a few crumbs attached. Baking times can vary! It may take longer in your oven.
  • Allow the cake to cool, in the pan, on a cooling rack for 10 minutes before turning out.
  • This recipe makes approximately 8 cups of batter.

Caramel Glaze

  • Using a medium size saucepan (deep enough to prevent boil over) melt the butter over medium heat.
  • Add the brown sugar and the remaining ingredients and heat on medium high heat.
  • Stir to blend, try to keep mixture off the sides of the pan. Once the mixture begins to boil, reduce the heat to low.
  • Simmer for 6 minutes, checking often to make sure that it is not going to boil over. It should still be bubbling. After 6 minutes, remove from heat.
  • Keep in mind that the caramel with thicken up a bit as it cools. You can pour it into a long glass casserole dish if you want it to cool more quickly. We often refrigerate to cool it off as well.
  • Makes about 1 cup caramel sauce. It can be kept in the refrigerator in an airtight container up to 2 weeks.

Notes

Substitution for Cake Flour:

(Using all purpose flour (plain in UK) to make Cake Flour) For each cup of flour in a recipe, remove 2 Tablespoons of flour and replace with 2 Tablespoons cornstarch (cornflour in the UK). This recipe has 3 cups of flour so you will measure out 3 cups of all purpose flour, remove 6 Tablespoons and replace with 6 Tablespoons cornstarch, whisk to blend