Recipes / Dessert
Brown-butter apple cake
Draft recipe — not yet cooked in this kitchen
A plain, tender cake with a layer of apple slices on top and the nutty depth of browned butter all the way through.
This is a cake for after a big meal: not too sweet, not too tall, and good with nothing more than a cup of coffee.
Browning the butter takes five minutes and changes the whole cake. Use a light-colored pan so you can see the milk solids turn from pale to deep gold, and pour every brown fleck into the bowl.
Brown-butter apple cake
- Serves
- 8
- Prep
- 25 min
- Cook
- 50 min
- Total
- 1 hr 15 min
Ingredients
Makes one 23 cm (9 in) cake
- 115 g (½ cup) unsalted butter, plus a little for the pan
- 190 g (1½ cups) all-purpose flour
- 1½ tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp fine salt
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- 150 g (¾ cup) granulated sugar, plus 15 g (1 tbsp) for the top
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- 120 ml (½ cup) whole milk
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 2 medium tart, firm apples, about 400 g (14 oz), peeled, cored and cut into 1 cm (½ in) slices
Method
Heat the oven to 180°C (350°F). Butter a 23 cm (9 in) springform pan and line the base with parchment paper.
Melt the butter in a light-colored saucepan over medium heat. Keep cooking, swirling the pan, until it foams, smells nutty and the solids on the bottom are deep golden, 5–7 minutes. Pour it into a large bowl, brown bits and all, and let it cool for 10 minutes.
In another bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon.
Add the sugar and eggs to the browned butter and whisk for 1 minute, until smooth and a little paler. Whisk in the milk and vanilla.
Fold the flour mixture into the wet mixture with a spatula, just until no dry streaks remain.
Spread the batter in the pan. Lay the apple slices on top in overlapping rings, pressing them in lightly, and sprinkle over the last 15 g (1 tbsp) of sugar.
Bake for 45–50 minutes, until the top is golden and a skewer pushed into the center comes out clean.
Cool in the pan for 15 minutes, then release the sides. Serve warm or at room temperature.