Glazed Autumn Cider Cake

Cider Days are over, but I still have cider on the brain–and in the refrigerator. So I baked a cider cake.

This recipe makes A LOT of cake; it’s great for a brunch or a coffee party. I was lucky enough to have the new Williams-Sonoma “Autumn Leaf” Bundt pan to cook with; it’s not only beautiful but large enough to hold all the batter.

(Full disclosure: Nordic Ware, which manufacturers the pan, gave it to me to play with. I wouldn’t be writing about it if I hadn’t loved working with it, however.)

If you’re serving fewer people or don’t have a huge Bundt pan, you might want to cut the recipe down by a third; use 1 cup butter, 2 cups sugar, and so forth. In that case, reduce the cooking time as well.

My family and friends had split opinions on the glaze. Several of us (including me) thought it added to the cake’s visual appeal just as glaze adds to the appeal of pottery; it made it shiny and gave it depth. The glaze’s crunch also gave the cake two textures instead of just one.

My mother decided that she would have preferred cream-cheese frosting to offset the cake’s spices. And one of my neighbors suggested that the cake would have been just as tasty with neither icing nor glaze. Experiment as you see fit!

Ingredients:

for the cake:

1-1/2 cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter at room temperature
3 cups sugar
6 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
3 cups flour
1 cup cider

for the glaze:

1/3 cup maple syrup
1/3 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
4 teaspoons cider

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour a large Bundt pan or spray it with Baker’s Joy. Cream the butter; then gradually add the sugar, beating well. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating after each addition. Beat in the vanilla. Stir in the baking powder, salt, and spices.
Gently add the flour to the creamed mixture alternately with the apple cider, beginning and ending with the flour.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan. Bake for 1 hour and 10 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Cool the cake for 15 minutes on a rack before removing it from the pan. While it is cooling prepare the glaze. Combine the glaze ingredients in a saucepan and bring them to a boil. Simmer them, stirring, for 3 to 5 minutes, until they are a little tacky.

Remove the cake from the pan when it is ready, positioning it on a rack under which you have placed waxed paper (the glaze is messy!). Gently spoon or brush the glaze over the cake, piercing a few holes in the cake if you like with a fork to help it absorb the glaze. You may want to wait a few minutes and then spoon up the glaze on the paper and put it back on the cake.

Let the cake cool completely before you serve it. Serves 12 to 16.