Birthday Cake Club: Honey Apple Butter Cake

A brighter, lighter celebration cake to make after apple picking.

Hi Bakers!

Get a bit overzealous with your apple picking over Labour Day weekend? Then this Honey Apple Butter Cake is perfect for you.

Before we dive into all the spice-heavy recipes and caramel-covered desserts of fall, I wanted to make a lighter apple cake to celebrate all of our September birthdays.

Don’t worry, we will get to the ultra cozy cakes and decadent desserts that help us get through the chillier days ahead. But for now, I’ve paired deeply flavorful apple butter with a zesty orange olive cake and floral honey buttercream. The piped buttercream flowers with apple butter centers are the icing on the cake.

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If you’ve never used apple butter in a recipe before, let this be a sign to try it. Apple butter is essentially applesauce that’s been sweetened, spiced, and cooked to thicken. The flavor gets so concentrated and allows you to infuse other desserts with intense apple flavor. 

Love apple butter? Try my Apple Butter Pie!

Making apple butter is an autumnal rite of passage. Pick way too many apples at the orchard? Make apple butter. Want your house to smell amazing? Make apple butter. Looking for a cozy activity during a storm? Make apple butter.

For the cake layers, I picked a super moist olive oil cake infused with orange zest. Where a lot of apple desserts are drowned in spices, I love the combination of orange and apple (and yes, there is plenty of cinnamon in there, too) that lets all of the flavors shine equally.

As for the buttercream, honey replaces some of the sugar in Swiss meringue buttercream. I added orange zest along with it to tie into the citrus flavors of the cake. You could use 100% honey, but the flavor gets pretty pronounced. 

Design inspired by Sweet Lion Heart