Shelley's Apple Pudding

Today is Dave's birthday so I want to share one of his all-time favorite desserts...Apple Pudding. I have no idea why it's called "pudding" because it's more like a thin spice cake but it's super moist with the pie filling in the batter so maybe that's it - and what can I say about the most delicious caramel-like sauce spooned over top of the warm cake other than it is heavenly. Truly a wonderful dessert!

Back story - early on in our relationship he took a fishing trip with the guys; Shelly, the cook at the lodge, made this one night and he took it upon himself to go back to the kitchen and ask her for the recipe for me. I didn't know him well enough at the time to know this is something he'd never done before, and he certainly hasn't done it since - this cake is that good :) So I have her hand-written recipe on a piece of notebook paper in my file, and Dave drew a little picture of himself on it with a big-ole belly indicating it's what he'd look like after eating this hahaha. I feel bad that I don't know what lodge he was at, or Shelley's last name, to give her credit - and she deserves it!

1 cup sugar
1/4 cup butter
2 eggs
1 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
2/3 teaspoon cinnamon
2/3 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 can apple pie filling

Cream sugar, butter and eggs. Add pie filling then remaining
ingredients. Mix thru. Bake 350' for 40 minutes.

Note the recipe doesn't say what size pan - I make it in a 13x9 sprayed with non-stick cooking spray, cut it into squares to serve, spoon the sauce over top. The cake is about an inch tall, you could probably make it in a smaller pan and have it be thicker but it's so good the way it turns out in the 13x9 I've never wanted to experiment with other sizes!

Sauce:

1/4 cup butter
1/2 cup evaporated milk
1 cup sugar
pinch salt
2 Tablespoons vanilla

Heat in a saucepan, serve hot.


one year ago today: banana muffins

Rolo Cupcakes

My niece Mickey requested cupcakes for her graduation party and sent me what seemed like hundreds of Pinterest ideas for what she would like. I decided to make 2 different flavors -'Rolo' which is a dark chocolate cake with caramel, and 'cookie dough' yellow cake with a ball of cookie dough in the batter ... she was thrilled.

The Rolo cupcakes are filled with homemade caramel, when I first looked at the recipe I was thinking that sounded like a lot of work and I wasn't crazy about that haha, but it was very easy to do and I'm going to be using this caramel recipe for lots of different things in addition to the cupcake filling. Don't let that part scare you off of making these! I followed the recipe exactly even though while I was waiting for the sugar to melt in a dry pan I was second guessing the instructions for sure! You put granulated sugar in a pan over medium heat and stir, and wait, and stir, and wait - it took quite a while before it started to melt and then it got weirdly chunky before it did indeed finally melt. Don't let it cook too long or the sugar will burn.

this is what the sugar did before melting completely. 

I'll admit I cheated on the cake part of the recipe; I planned to make the cake from scratch as instructed but then saw that I had a devils food cake mix in the cupboard and decided to use that as a short cut. I did add a big scoop of sour cream and a handful of mini chocolate chips to the batter to jazz it up a little.

After the cupcakes are baked and cool, scoop out some of the top (I cut a circle with a sharp knife and then scooped it out with a small spoon saving the cake I removed) and fill with a little less than a tablespoon of cooled caramel sauce, replace the piece of cake you removed, then frost with chocolate buttercream and drizzle with a little more caramel. Top with an unwrapped Rolo.

These turned out super good, the only negative I heard was that they are almost too moist - I think the caramel soaks into the cake quite a bit so it gives it a very moist texture, you almost want to eat them with a fork. But really, if the only downside is chocolate cake that is too moist (instead of dry!) then I'm good with that.