Applesauce Cake with Brown Butter Glaze

This recipe for Applesauce Cake with Brown Butter Glaze features an update with a nutty buttery glaze. Applesauce cake is a spectacular option for savoring alongside a cup of coffee or tea for breakfast and dessert any time of day.

Applesauce Cake with Brown Butter Glaze Recipe

This homemade applesauce cake is a double duty kind of dessert. It can literally be served for breakfast like a coffee cake, for brunch, tea time or as a sweet ending to your meal. Classic additions to the batter include raisins and toasted nuts such as walnuts or pecans with a warm spice blend to season the batter. How to make Applesauce Cake with Brown Butter Glaze: (Scroll down for full printable recipe.)

• Toast Pecans – Preheat oven to 350°F. Spread pecans in a single layer on a baking sheet. Toast for 6-8 minutes until fragrant then set aside to cool. Lower oven temperature to 325°F.
• Creamed Ingredients – Using an electric mixer, cream together butter, granulated sugar, brown sugar and vanilla. Beat until fully combined.
• Eggs – Add eggs one at a time beating well after each addition.
• Dry Ingredients – In a separate medium size mixing bowl, use a whisk to sift together flour, cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cloves and nutmeg.
• Combine – To the bowl add the dry ingredients alternately with the applesauce beginning and ending with flour. Mix until fully combined. Fold in pecans by hand.
• Prepare Pan – Butter and flour a 10 inch Tube pan (Angel food cake pan) or spray with baking spray.
• Transfer Batter to Pan – Spread batter evenly in pan.
• Bake – Bake per the recipe until a toothpick inserted into the center shows moist crumbs.
• Cool – Remove from oven and cool in pan for 20 minutes, then remove to a cooling rack to cool completely.
• Brown Butter Glaze – Melt butter over medium-low heat in a heavy bottomed saucepan. simmer for 5-10 minutes until amber in color. Remove from heat, and pour into a mixing bowl leaving as much of browned sediment behind as possible. (You can also strain through a fine mesh sieve)
• Add powdered sugar and vanilla to the mixing bowl, whisking or beating with an electric mixer until combined. Add half and half as needed.
• Drizzle glaze over cooled cake and garnish with reserved 1/4 cup pecans. Store chilled in an airtight container.

How to Make the Best Applesauce Cake with Brown Butter Glaze Recipe

• Ingredients you’ll need to make homemade Applesauce Cake Recipe: All purpose flour, applesauce, granulated sugar, brown sugar, butter, chopped pecans, ground cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves or allspice, baking powder, baking soda, salt, large eggs and vanilla extract.
• To Make the Brown Butter Glaze recipe you’ll need: Butter, powdered sugar, vanilla extract and heavy cream.
• Kitchen tools you’ll need: A stand mixer or a hand mixer, measuring cups and spoons, a whisk, a rubber spatula, an angel food pan, a sheet pan to toast the pecans, a saucepan to brown the butter for the glaze, a sharp knife or nut chopper and a cooling rack.
• You can use plain or cinnamon spiced applesauce for this cake.
• I highly recommend baking this cake in a tube pan, also called an angel food pan, to give it plenty of room to expand while baking.
• This cake freezes beautifully. You can freeze it glazed, or wait and drizzle with brown butter glaze after thawing.
• The nutty sweet brown butter glaze is what sets this applesauce cake apart. That said, you can enjoy this cake with a simple dusting of powdered sugar, too.
• Traditional applesauce cake often includes raisins. You can add 1 cup of  raisins to the batter along with the pecans with no other adjustments needed.
• Toasted walnuts can be substituted in place of pecans.
• When browning the butter for the glaze, the milk solids left behind will turn dark. Be careful, or the butter will burn, if it’s left unattended. When pouring it into the mixing bowl, try to leave as much dark sediment behind in the pot as possible. Please note, some darker flecks may slip through. I actually like this, but if it bothers you, strain the butter through a fine mesh sieve to remove.
• Store glazed Applesauce Cake with Brown Butter Glaze in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 1 week. You can also freeze this cake for up to 3 months.

What is Brown Butter?

Making browned butter is a simple process done on the stovetop. It’s achieved by slow simmering butter until it’s ever so slightly past its melting point separating and toasting the milk solids in the butter. Doing so, gives the butter a nutty taste and in this recipe, it adds a depth of flavor to the glaze. It takes this old fashioned applesauce cake to another level.

More Southern Style Apple Dessert Recipes to Make

The warm spicy seasonings that usually accompany apple recipes are the kind  that make you feel warm and fuzzy inside. Other apple recipes you may enjoy trying:

• My recipe for Apple Pie Cinnamon Rolls will take you from breakfast to dessert.
• This Apple Baked Oatmeal is a fantastic way to make oatmeal for the family in one fell swoop.
• Apple Cider Doughnut Cake is coated with cinnamon and sugar.
• Harvest Apple Bread is packed with flavor.
• These Apple Pie Bars can be served just as they are or with a drizzle of caramel.
• These Apple Fritters are like a fluffy bakery doughnut coated in a vanilla cream glaze.
• You may also like this recipe for Delightfully Baked Apples from Skinnytaste.

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Helpful Kitchen Items:

• 10-inch Angel Food Pan with Removable Bottom
• Stand Mixer
• Cake Pedestal
• Silicone Spatulas