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This Best Apple Cake Ever is super moist and delicious with the perfect amount of sweetness and spice!
If you’re still looking for an easy – and really delicious – dessert to serve over the holidays, have we got the recipe for you! My sister-in-law Pam shared this recipe with us over email with the subject line: “Best Apple Cake Ever!”
Pam celebrated her birthday last month, and a friend of hers showed up with this cake – the best apple cake ever. In fact – the cake was so good, the three of them ate the entire cake in about 24 hours.
Pam then made this apple cake for us for Thanksgiving – and it was so good, Jack and I immediately looked at each other and said, “We’re making this for our blog!”
This apple cake is moist and delicious with the perfect amount of sweetness and spice – plus large chunks of apple and chopped walnuts add great flavor and texture to the cake too. Once this apple cake comes out of the oven, a wonderful sweet buttery vanilla glaze is poured over the top which soaks in to make the cake even more delicious.
Not only is this apple cake really delicious – but it’s also very easy to prepare.
Can I make this cake in a 9×13-inch pan?
Yes – and this easy apple cake comes out just as moist and delicious. Click here to see the instructions for baking this apple cake in a 9×13-inch pan.
You may enjoy these other Bundt Cakes:
- Spiced Eggnog Chocolate Chip Cake
- Kathy’s Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cake
- Toffee Pecan Bundt Cake with Caramel Drizzle
- Chocolate Raspberry Bundt Cake
We love seeing what you made! Tag us on Instagram at @afamilyfeast or hashtag #afamilyfeast so we can see your creations!
Best Apple Cake Ever
This Best Apple Cake Ever is super moist and delicious with the perfect amount of sweetness and spice!
Ingredients
Baking spray with flour, or shortening and flour to grease the pan
For the Cake
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 2 teaspoons cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 1/2 cups vegetable oil
- 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 3 eggs
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- 3 large apples, peeled and cut into large pieces (Note: The original recipe calls for tart green apples, but we used some red Cortland apples we had on hand and it was delicious!)
- 1 cup chopped walnuts (optional)
For the Glaze
- 3 tablespoons butter
- 3 tablespoons brown sugar
- 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 3 tablespoons heavy cream
- 1/4 teaspoon vanilla
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour a 12-cup Bundt pan and set aside.
- In a large bowl, sift together flour, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt. Sift two additional times and set aside.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine oil and both sugars, and mix until well blended.
- Add eggs one at a time, mixing thoroughly after each addition. Add vanilla and mix again.
- Add the sifted dry ingredients to the batter and mix thoroughly. By hand, fold in apples and walnuts and mix until evenly combined.
- Spoon the batter into the prepared bundt pan. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.
- Remove cake from the oven and allow to cool in the bundt pan for 20 minutes.
- While the cake is cooling, prepare the glaze. In a saucepan, over medium heat, combine all of the glaze ingredients. Bring to a boil and allow the mixture to boil for 1 minute.
- Remove the cake from the pan, onto a serving plate. Spoon the glaze over the warm cake.
- Cool for a little longer before serving.
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My family LOVES this cake! We add dark rum as was suggested and it is oh, so good! My husband keeps requesting that I make it into cupcakes so that he can control himself 🤣. Has anyone tried that yet?
Hi Pamela – I know we’ve had other readers tell us that they made mini bundt cakes and others have asked about baking the batter in muffin/cupcake tins. I’m sure you can, although I don’t know the specifics about how long to bake, etc. Hope that helps – and glad you enjoyed the cake!
I made this recipe substituting applesauce for 1/2 the oil volume (i.e., 3/4 cup oil, 3/4 cup applesauce)., keeping everything else the same. It was delicious and less sinful.
Thanks for the suggestion Kevin!
I’ve made this cake twice, following all the instructions completely, and it’s delicious, but both times it stuck in the Bundt pan and tore in half as I was trying to put in on the serving dish! What can I do to prevent that?
Hi Barbara – In the past, I’ve had bundt cakes stick when I was using a lightweight aluminum bundt pan that overly browned the cake and caused it to stick. Once I switched to a heavier weight, Nordicware, non stick bundt pan that definitely helped. If you are already using a good-quality bundt pan, I’d definitely look at perhaps greasing your pan even more. I have found that the Pam baking spray with flour works well, but other brands not so well. Without being in the kitchen with you, it’s hard to say why you’ve had such sticking problems. Hope that helps.
Is it possible to put metric measurements as well please as I find sometimes when I try to convert it never works out for me.
Saying that I love your recipes. Many thanks .
Hi Carol – Thanks for your feedback and kind words. Unfortunately, we find the exact same issue with converting recipes to metrics…we cook using US customary/imperial measurements so that’s how we write and share our recipes.
We’ve tried using some of the online calculators ourselves and the results never quite seem to work out – even when the recipe sites have the option to toggle between metric and imperial measurements. Because of that, we’ve made the choice to share the measurements in a way that we can feel totally confident it’s correct through our own testing in the kitchen.
I’m sorry, I know it’s probably not the answer you were hoping for.
Martha
This IS the best Apple Cake recipe ever. I’m 54, my mother has made this exact recipe (only no brown sugar, but 2 cups sugar instead) since I was a child. My father would take one into work at the holidays and it became a well anticipated treat for his co-workers.
We even joked it had apples, so it was appropriate for breakfast. She didn’t make the glaze, but honestly – it didn’t need it. I had to dig up her recipe to compare to yours and other than the brown sugar, it was exactly the same!
What a nice memory Robin! I’m pretty sure this cake recipe has been around for a long time!
That Apple cake looks so moist and yummy. Can’t wait to try it. So glad to have found your site. Thanks and God Bless
We’re glad you found us too Irene!
This is by far “the best” apple cake! I’m 65 and have made my share of them. Thank you for sharing this
You’re very welcome Linda! 🙂
Just wanted to know if I could use cake flour instead of all purpose flour or will it not work for this recipe.
We’ve never tried it Ann…if you do, please let us know how it comes out!
This cake is AWESOME! I lost my other apple cake recipe and found this one arrested to be very close. I made the cake exactly per the recipe and carried it to a small family gathering this thanksgiving. The cake was devoured pronto. Even folks who aren’t huge fans of dessert said this cake was delicious! This recipe is a keeper!! It was also a beautiful cake too!
So glad the recipe was a hit Linda!
If I want to serve this tomorrow, should I wait to out the glaze on or should I put it on tonight?
Hi Christine – Either way will work.