Maylee at Beyond Gumbo 
Take a little guilt out of the holidays with this lighter version of a pound cake. “Lite Apple Pound Cake” makes a few modifications to lower the fat, sugar and calories. The cake is still tender and flavorful. Tucked in the center of the cake is a layer of fresh apples, orange juice with a pinch of cinnamon. The recipe was originally featured on the cover in a vintage Cooking Light magazine. I seem to be all into apples this year — and had to check out this intriguing cake recipe. I’m glad I did, because this turned out to be a very satisfying cake — perfect for a brunch, dessert or even a snack during the holidays.
This cake is delicious — a tender, flavorful cake. It is moist, yet dense and reminds me of a pound cake. So, that’s what I’m calling my cake, “Lite Apple Pound Cake.” However, the fat, sugar and calories are reduced compared to a traditional pound cake. The fresh apples in the cake add a little nutritional value, too.
Reducing the calories in a cake recipe
The “Fresh Apple Coffee Cake” as featured on the cover of a vintage Cooking Light magazine looked so tempting. I had investigate to see what this “healthy” cake recipe was all about. In a recipe monthly column, the Cooking Light staff takes a traditional, high calorie recipe and goes to great lengths to reduce the fat and calories. That is challenging when it comes to cake, because the ingredients in a cake are basically butter (or oil), eggs, sugar and flour. Can you do it? The Cooking Light staff reduced the oil and sugar in the coffee cake by half without any noticable results. They used skim milk for cream, used egg substitutes for eggs and orange juice for molasses. The calories per serving were reduced from 360/kcal to 201/kcal per serving. Pretty impressive. (See Reference.)
Here is the Cooking Light cake. The magazine’s “Fresh Apple Coffee Cake” had a layer of apples on the top — I skipped this step and put all the apples in the center of the cake.
I made my own adjustments to the recipe. For substitutions, I added back the whole eggs replacing the egg substitutes. I used butter rather than diet margarine in the recipe because diet margarine contains water as a filler and just does not cream well in cake batter. I added a powdered sugar glaze on top of the cake.
I baked the cake in a tubular cake pan; you could also bake this in mini-cake pans to give as gifts.
Ingredients
Here are the ingredients for my cake recipe.
It is important to use cake flour in the recipe — that is a key to getting a tender cake. Swans Down brand is easy to locate in our grocery stores, that’s generally what I use for cake flour. The orange juice is compliments of McDonald’s — thank you very much. The recipe uses 4 large eggs (replacement for 8-oz egg substitute). However, the sugar (1 cup) and butter (1/2 cup) are cut in half from the original recipe as given to Cooking Light to modify. The apples are a combination of Honey Crisp and Cosmic Crisp apples. Although the photo shows 4 apples; I quickly discovered that this was enough for 2 cakes!! I have plenty of chopped apples for another recipe.
Making the recipe
To get things ready, chop up the apples. I used my food processer to do this step quickly. No need to peel the apples. Then mix the apples with orange juice and cinnamon and set aside.
So many apples! Four apples is enough for 2 recipes. I’ll have to think of something else to make.
Cake Batter
This is a traditional cake recipe. That means getting out the trusty electric mixer to mix up the cake batter. Cream the butter and sugar, add in the eggs and vanilla extract. Beat and beat and beat until these ingredients are thickened and lemony in color. Then add the dry ingredients (cake flour, baking powder and salt) alternately with milk/orange juice. At this point, mix as little as possible — just enough to blend in the flour.
The cake batter has a creamy, yellow color. This comes from the orange juice which is part of the liquid ingredients.
Pour about half of the cake batter into a well-oiled tube cake pan. Layer on all of the apple mixture (drain off any excess juice). Then spread on the rest of the batter on the top. Bake.
An advantage of using a tubular cake pan is that the bottom is not attached. Lift up on the center tube and the cake easily lifts out. Very easy to transfer to a serving platter
For my cake, I drizzled an orange juice glaze om top of the cake. This cake just needed a bit of extra sweetness. Mix confectioners’ sugar with orange juice until thick. Drizzle on the cake.
Pretty good for a re-make of a re-make! Now I have a delicious pound cake (or coffee cake) to serve at brunch as well as a dessert during the holidays that is not so, so rich.
Enjoy healthy holidays this year.
Lite Apple Pound Cake
Ingredients for Cake:
- 2 medium-sized Honey Crisp or Cosmic Crisp apples
- 1/2 cup orange juice, divided
- 1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened at room temperature for several hours
- 1 cup sugar
- 4 eggs
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup milk (skim, low-fat or whole)
- 3 cups cake flour, sifted
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 recipe Orange Glaze
- apple and orange slices, garnish, if desired
- rosemary sprigs, garnish, if desired
Ingredients for Orange Glaze:
- 1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar, more as needed
- 1 Tbsp orange juice, plus 1 to 2 additional tsp as needed
Method and Steps for cake:
- Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Oil bottom and sides of a 10-inch tube pan.
- Core apples and cut into quarters. Do not peel, Using food processor with shredding disk, shred apples. Reserve a few apple slices for garnish.
- Transfer apples to a large bowl. Toss with 1/4 cup orange juice and cinnamon. Mix well. Set aside.
- Add softened butter to large mixing bowl of electric mixer. On medium speed, slowly sprinkle in sugar. Beat until sugar is incorporated and mixture is fluffy.
- Add eggs, one at a time. Beat after each addition on medium speed. Then beat until the mixture is thickened and lemony in color, up to 5 minutes.
- Beat in vanilla extract.
- In a separate bowl, sift together flour, baking powder and salt.
- Combine milk and remaining 1/4 cup orange juice in another small bowl.
- With mixer running on low speed, add flour mixture to creamed mixture alternately with milk/orange juice. Begin and end with flour mixture. Scape sides down as needed. Mix only until ingredients are combined.
- Pour 1/2 of the cake batter into prepared tube pan.
- Drain apple mixture. Spread apple mixture evenly on top of cake batter.
- Pour remaining cake batter over the apples and spread out evenly.
- Bake in 350 degree oven for 50 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean.
- Cool in pan for 10 minutes. Run a knife around the pan edge and cake remove from pan, cool on wire rack.
- Then remove bottom of pan, transfering to cake platter.
- Drizzle Orange Glaze over top of cake.
- If desired, garnish with fresh orange and apple slices and rosemary sprigs.
Method and Steps for Orange Glaze:
- Place confectioners’ sugar in a small bowl.
- Add 1 Tbsp orange juice. Stir to combine. If too thick, add 1 tsp additional orange juice at a time to obtain a glaze with is thick but pourable. Alternatively, add confectioners’ sugar, 1 Tbsp at a time, if too thin. Glaze will dry quickly, best prepared just before using. If needed, thin down with 1/2 tsp orange juice.
Reference:
“Make it Light” by Elizabeth J. Taliaferro, Cooking Light Vol 4 No. 6, 1990, page 76,
Jeffrey C. Ward, Publisher
7Make6
What a beautiful cake!
Thank you! Yes, the cake is tasty, too!
This looks yummy! I’ll take a slice with my morning coffee, please. 😊
Thanks, Yes,love this cake with coffee — any time of the day, especially morning.