Apple caramel cake

Name: Apple caramel cake
Yield: Serves 16
Ingredients: 60 g dried apple rings or slices, finely chopped; 2 tsp ground mixed spice; 2 tbsp ground cinnamon; 125 g medjool dates, stoned and finely chopped; ¼ tsp baking powder; 85 g golden caster sugar; 1–1½ tsp vanilla extract; 125 g full-fat cream cheese; 300 g self-raising flour; 100 g icing sugar, sifted; 175 g unsalted butter, softened; 5 medium eggs, at room temperature, beaten; 325 g unsalted butter, softened; 250 g light brown muscovado sugar; 175 ml double cream; 5 tbsp cloudy apple juice; 175 g golden caster sugar; 1 Bramley apple

Preparation info

Serves
16

Difficulty
Medium

Appears in

Prue

By Prue Leith

Published 2018

About

This is quite a cake! I adapted this recipe from one by Kate Lyon, who was a Bake Off finalist in 2017. The sponge layers are made with dates, spices and pieces of dried apple, and are then sandwiched together with a caramel buttercream.

It is a huge celebratory affair, but it need not be this big. Just halve the quantities and cook in two tins for 5 minutes less (the mixture will not be so deep). And, of course, if you don’t have time to fiddle about making