Facebook is a wonderful thing, most of the time anyways. The more you like, link, share or copy posts on your timeline, the more similar posts you receive. I love baking and trying out new recipes and this recipe from The Recipe Critic come through my timeline. I knew I wanted to try it. Reading the ingredients, it reminded me of my recent post forDo Nothing Cake that my husband loved so much so I figured this would be a winner also.

Ingredients
4 cups Granny Smith Apples, chopped into small pieces
2 cups sugar
½ cup vegetable oil
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1tsp vanilla
2 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
2 tsp cinnamon
½ tsp nutmeg
1 tsp salt
½ cup milk
1 cup pecans roughly chopped

Brown Sugar Cream Cheese Frosting:

1 8 oz package cream cheese, room temperature
½ cup butter, softened
2 tsp vanilla
1 cup golden brown sugar

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350° and grease and flour a 9×13 inch baking pan.

Peel and dice apples.
Slight beat eggs.In a large mixing bowl, combine apples and sugar. Stir in oil, eggs and vanilla.

In another mixing bowl combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt. Add the flour mixture to the apple mixture. Add milk and stir until jum combined. Add chopped pecans.

Pour into a prepared 9 x 13 inch pan.

Bake for 30-40 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Let cool completely.

To make the frosting:

Beat the cream cheese until smooth. Add butter and continue to beat until smooth, scraping down sides when needed. Add vanilla and brown sugar. Beat for 5 minutes until it is light and fluffy and the sugar has dissolved. Spread evenly on top of the cake. Refrigerate after frosting.

This cake is very, very dense and moist. I baked the cake for 40 minutes and did the doneness test as always using a toothpick and when inserted, it came out clean. However (and there’s always a however), I found after I’d iced the cake, the center fell. I’d never had that happen before and wasn’t sure what it meant until I cut it and found that the center had not baked completely and was still gooey. Other than that, the cake was wonderful. We just had to eat around the center.

To download a PDF of this recipe, click here: Apple Pecan Spice Cake with Brown Sugar Cream Cheese Frosting.