Applesauce Cake

When I was a teenager in the 1970’s, there was a popular TV show called “The Waltons”.  Originally, the Walton Family came to the TV screen in a Christmas movie called “The Homecoming” starring Patricia Neal and Andrew Duggan, about a poverty-stricken family in the Blue Ridge Mountains during the 1930’s.  I remember watching it & loving the story.  When it was made into an hour-long TV series a year later, I was one of its first fans.

“The Homecoming” and the scripts for “The Waltons” TV series were written by Earl Hamner, Jr.  He also wrote many other novels & TV scripts.  I bought “The Homecoming” in March, 1974 & I still own the book.  It had a picture of “John Boy Walton” on the cover — the main character of the series at that point.

It’s a really wonderful little novel.  I highly recommend it, especially this time of year.

On the final two pages of the novel is the recipe for applesauce cake that the mother Olivia is so intent on making for the Christmas holiday and the whiskey frosting that is made with the moonshine “recipe” that the two old lady moonshiners sell to their neighbors, seemingly unknowing that it’s alcohol.  When I was fourteen, I made the cake for the first time, using the most expensive bourbon in my parents’ liquor cabinet for the frosting.  I now make this cake every Yuletime.

If you don’t have a copy of “The Homecoming”, you can find an official version of Olivia’s Applesauce Cake here:  http://www.the-waltons.com/cake.html.  There are many other versions on many other websites.  Both Taste of Home & Allrecipes have very good examples of other kinds of applesauce cake.

Naturally I don’t make it just like the recipe is written, either.  It called for the use of a “cake mold” — I am assuming that means a Bundt cake pan — which I have never owned.  Also, if you make the frosting as directed, it is going to be quite thin — really an icing, rather than a frosting.  Which makes sense, if you’re making a Bundt cake, since you only use a icing over those kinds of cakes.  So I generally just make an ordinary butter-cream frosting & flavor it with bourbon instead of vanilla.

Another change I’ve made is I use chopped cranberries instead of golden raisins.  I have never particularly liked golden raisins & I think the red of the cranberries is more festive.

So here is the recipe:

Olivia’s Applesauce Cake

1 cup butter

1 cup sugar

2 cups applesauce

2 cups light raisins

1 cup chopped walnuts

1 teaspoon baking soda

3 1/2 cups flour

2 eggs

1 teaspoon cinnamon

2 teaspoons cloves

2 teaspoons nutmeg

pinch of salt

sift together:  flour, soda, salt, cinnamon, cloves & nutmeg.  Take a small amount of the flour mixture & mix it into the chopped nuts & raisins.  Set both aside.  Cream butter until whipped soft.  Add sugar a little at a time until mixture is smooth.  Beat in eggs vigorously.  Alternatively stir in flour mixture & applesauce.  When all mixed together, add nuts & raisins & mix well.  Pour batter into a well-greased cake mold.  Bake in a pre-heated oven for one hour.  Cool ten minutes, then turn out on a cake rack.  Frost with Whiskey Frosting when cake is cool.

Jane’s Whiskey Frosting

1/4 cup butter

1 tablespoon cream

pinch of salt

2 tablespoons sugar

2 tablespoons bourbon

Cream butter, add sugar & salt, then cream & whiskey.  Whip until smooth.  Frost cake.  Decorate with a sprig of holly.

 

creamed butter & sugar

sifted dry ingredients

chopped nuts & cranberries

process of alternately mixing dry ingredients & applesauce

ready to go into the oven

after baking

ONE THING — the recipe states that the cake gets baked for ONE HOUR.  However, in a 13×9 oblong pan (like the one pictured above), the baking time is only 30 minutes or so.  I mean, it’ll depend on your own oven but use your sight & your scent & the tried & true method of sticking a knife in the middle & if it comes out clean, it’s done!

This cake will make your house smell like HEAVEN !!!  I am a chocoholic but this cake smells so good I would love to cook it everyday just to have this fragrance in the house all the time.

So try this cake!  & read “The Homecoming” by Earl Hamner, Jr.  If your local library doesn’t have it, you can get it for pennies on Amazon.  It’s worth it!