Apple And Thyme Cake
A fabulous autumnal apple and thyme cake to celebrate apple season. The texture is smooth and velvety and the flavour is sweet, tart, subtly spicy and very slightly herby. Perfect with a cup of tea after a long walk.
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I’ve made and eaten many an apple cake in my time and they’ve all been good. However, this apple and thyme cake is up there with the best of them. It’s the one I make most often as the ingredients are simple and the results are pleasing.
Too Many Recipes
I first made this apple and thyme cake many years ago, when food bloggers actually had time for a bit of fun. Tin and Thyme was a chocolate blog back then.
Dom’s random recipe challenge that month was to randomly pick something from our stashes of magazines, cuttings and pull-outs. He knows us so well. Don’t we all have a pile of those lurking around somewhere, trying to attract our attention and making us feel guilty?
In my more organised moments, I gather clippings and old envelope jottings and put them in folders. Three in fact, one for sweet stuff, one for savoury and one for Christmas. Annoyingly, I hadn’t yet got organised enough to have one for chocolate.
However, I’m not as efficient as I’d like to be, so most of them were still lying about the house in various places or used as bookmarks. I was NOT going to embark on a mega house-clearance and recipe sort out week, so I put my hand into the file for sweet recipes and hoped for the best. And low, I pulled out … another apple cake recipe!!!
Oh well, six apple cakes down. At least as many to go.
I’d pretty much thought I’d done my bit for apples that month, but I was mistaken. The recipe I picked was for Lord Lambourne Apple & Thyme Cake. It came from an RHS Grow Your Own card that I think I picked up about four years previously when visiting RHS Rosemoor in North Devon.
Anyway, I had plenty of apples from my mother’s tree, the use of thyme seemed interesting and I could easily add chocolate chips into the mix, so I started peeling apples.
Lord Lambourne Apple
Lord Lambourne (Malus domestica) is a British dessert apple. It came onto the market in 1907 and was developed from the apple varieties James Grieve and Worcester Pearmain.
It’s a crisp and juicy apple with a thin skin and high levels of both sugar and acidity. This gives it a particularly good depth of flavour. Reminiscent of strawberries, apparently.
Lord Lambournes were very popular back in the day, but commercial pressures and newer more robust varieties took their toll. Now they’re mostly grown in private gardens and the occasional small orchard.
I don’t know that I’ve ever tried one, but now I’ve found out how good they are, I really want to.
Needless to say, I didn’t have any Lord Lambourne apples when I first made this cake. And actually I’m not sorry. I think cooking apples work much better in this cake than dessert ones.
Cooking apples have a lovely tart flavour which balances the sweetness of the cake perfectly. They also have a soft consistency, which means they almost disappear into the cake batter. This results in a beautifully smooth and velvety mouthfeel, which I really value.
How To Make Apple And Thyme Cake
Turns out that chocolate isn’t the best addition to this cake. That first time I made it, I added 50g (nearly 2oz) of milk chocolate chips (40%). The cake was delicious, but the chocolate rather overwhelmed the other flavours, particularly the thyme, which is quite subtle.
I’ve made the cake several times since, but have never used chocolate again. It’s the better for it.
As well as being very smooth in the mouth, it has the most delicious notes of both cinnamon and toffee apple.
I no longer have the original recipe and over the years it’s morphed anyway. I’m pretty sure wholemeal spelt flour wasn’t one of the original ingredients. It’s my favourite flour for baking cakes though.
Step 1. Prepare Apples
Peel, core and roughly chop the apples. Try to do this as quickly as you can to prevent the apples oxidising and going brown.
Place in a small saucepan and scatter with the sugar and cinnamon. This will also help prevent the apples from browning.
Add the butter and place over a medium heat. Bring the apples to the boil, turn the heat down and simmer gently for about five minutes, or until the apples are soft.
Take off the heat and allow to cool whilst you’re making the cake.
Step 2. Make Apple And Thyme Cake
First line your cake tin and lightly butter the sides. A deep round loose bottomed tin* is best for this cake. Ideally one with a quick release mechanism.
Strip the thyme leaves from their stalks. Roughly chop if the leaves are large ones.
Cream the butter, both sugars, thyme leaves and ground cardamom, if using. You can use electric mixers for this, but I find a bowl and wooden spoon is easy enough and creates less mess. The key is to ensure your butter is soft to start with. Beat together until the colour is pale and the texture fluffy.
Beat in the eggs, one by one. This is usually enough to prevent curdling, but if the batter does start to curdle, add a little of the flour.
Sift in the flour, baking powder and cinnamon and stir until just combined.
Add the apples and stir again until the mixture is just combined. It’s never a good idea to mix cake batter too vigorously as it can make the cake somewhat tough.
Step 3. Bake Apple And Thyme Cake
Scrape the batter into the tin and level it with the back of a spoon. Alternatively give it a couple of sharp bangs on a hard surface.
Place it on the middle shelf of your preheated oven. Bake until the cake is well risen and an inserted skewer comes out clean. Check on it after forty five minutes and if it looks as though the cake still has a way to go, but is browning too fast on top, cover it with baking parchment or brown paper.
Once baked, remove from the oven, but leave in the tin to cool for ten minutes. This gives the cake a chance to shrink away from the sides, which means it’s less likely to stick.
Turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
Once cool, place on a serving plate and dust with a little icing sugar mixed with ground cinnamon, if liked.
Alternatively wrap in greaseproof paper and keep in an airtight tin. Will keep in a cool place for three to four days.
Other Apple Cakes You Might Like
- Almond apple cider cake
- Dorset apple cake
- Hazelnut and apple chocolate cake
- Irish apple cake
- Triple apple cake
- Upside-down apple cake
I also have a fragrant quince cake, which I based on this recipe.
Keep in Touch
Thanks for visiting Tin and Thyme. If you make this apple and thyme cake, I’d love to hear about it in the comments below. And do please rate the recipe. Have you any top tips? Do share photos on social media too and use the hashtag #tinandthyme, so I can spot them.
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If you’d like more apple recipes, follow the link and you’ll find I have quite a lot of them. All delicious and nutritious, of course.
Choclette x
Apple And Thyme Cake. PIN IT.
Apple And Thyme Cake
Equipment
- 1 loose-based 20cm (8″) round nonstick cake tin (affiliate link) quick release recommended
Ingredients
Apples
- 3 cooking apples weighing around 400g (I used a Cornish variety)
- 25 g golden caster sugar (I used cardamom sugar)
- 25 g unsalted butter
- ½ tsp ground cinnamon
Cake
- 125 g unsalted butter softened
- 125 g golden caster sugar (I used cardamom sugar)
- 100 g light muscovado sugar
- 3 sprig fresh thyme
- 3 cardamom pods (optional)
- 3 large eggs
- 200 g wholemeal flour (whole wheat) (I used wholemeal spelt)
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
Optional Sugar Coating
- 1 tsp icing sugar
- ⅛ tsp ground cinnamon
Instructions
Apples
- Peel, core and roughly chop the apples. Do this as quickly as possible so that the apples don’t have time to oxidise and turn brown.3 cooking apples
- Place in a small pan. Sprinkle the sugar and cinnamon over the top then add the butter. Bring to the boil, then simmer gently for a five minutes or so until soft. Take off the heat and allow to cool.25 g golden caster sugar, 25 g unsalted butter, ½ tsp ground cinnamon
Cake
- Set the oven to 160℃ (140℃ fan, 320℉, Gas 3).
- Remove the leaves from the thyme sprigs and chop if they’re particularly large.3 sprig fresh thyme
- Extract the seeds from the cardamom pods, if using. Grind them to a powder with a pestle and mortar.3 cardamom pods
- In a large bowl, cream the butter together with the sugars, thyme leaves and cardamom, if using. A wooden spoon is best for this, although you can use an electric mixer if you prefer. Keep going until the mixture is pale in colour and fluffy in texture.125 g unsalted butter, 125 g golden caster sugar, 100 g light muscovado sugar
- Beat in the eggs, one by one.3 large eggs
- Sift in the flour, baking powder and cinnamon and stir until just combined.200 g wholemeal flour (whole wheat), 2 tsp baking powder, 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- Stir in the cooked apples until just combined.
- Scrape the batter into a deep lined 20cm cake tin and bake for 50 minutes or until an inserted skewer comes out clean. If the top looks like it’s getting too brown, cover with a sheet of parchment or brown paper
- Allow to cool in the tin for ten minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
Optional Sugar Coating
- Mix the icing sugar and cinnamon together, then dust over the top of the cooled cake.1 tsp icing sugar, ⅛ tsp ground cinnamon
Notes
Nutrition Estimate
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This looks so lovely and moist, I love the addition of the thyme.
I don’t use herbs enough in baking. Thyme is one of the few things I manage to grow in our garden, so it would be good to use it more often.
Ruth – I thought this worked really well. I’m making this again next week for a party.
Apple and thyme sounds like fantastic combination – another one I now want to try in the future…
Karen – he he, you mean I’ve created a Goddess 😉
Janice – the thyme really appealed to me too.
Shu Han – thanks for visiting. The thyme is a very nice addition.
C – it’s certainly the season for apple cake and I expect I’ll be making one or two more before the season is out.
It looks gorgeous, I’m another apple cake lover so this sounds fab. I like the idea of adding the thyme too.
linked over from dom’s! so surprised to see thyme in an apple cake!
That looks nice. I like the idea of thyme in an apple cake.
I LOVE the name of the cake and it sounds delicious too ~ apple cakes are the goddesses of Autumn cakes and yours looks brilliant.
Karen
Johanna – I’m wondering if it’s the pre-cooking of the apples that gives this such a silky texture – it’s that or the mesquite powder!
Dom – hope you’re feeling a bit more the thing now – the copious quantities of cake you’ve been consuming should have sorted you out 😉
Victoria – I guess it depends how strong the thyme is – ours wasn’t very and the flavour was only faintly there.
Chele – you’re probably right there – what would I do next year otherwise 😉
Liz – ha ha – tis disconcerting 😉
BVG – thank you, it has a really lovely smooth texture which makes it extra scrummy.
Jo – thank you.
A Trifle Rushed – it’s nice to be surprised – mostly!
Grazing Kate – for cardamom sugar, I have a jar of sugar with a handful of cardamom pods which live there – just keep topping up with sugar every time I use some. A bit annoying having to sieve the sugar first, but it’s a small price really. I just love all the garden rooms at Rosemoor.
Hannah – depends on the strength of your thyme – rather wishing I’d used more.
Hazel – I just substituted mesquite for some of the flour. I’m experimenting with it at the moment.
Little Loaf – yes funny how we cut things out obviously thinking they are worth making and then just forget all about.
CC – even more than butter?
Sarah – thank you. I’m just about to have a slice right now 😉
I love apple cakes, thyme would be brilliant. Mmm really fancy a slice now…
Now that sounds interesting – never had thyme in a cake before. Can never go wrong with apple though…best…cake…ingredient….EVER!
What a wonderful and unusual recipe. I’m always hoarding magazine pages, clippings and recipe cards too – really must get around to digging some out soon, especially if I can discover gems like this!
this cake really appeals to me but unfortunately i have never seen mesquite powder here in melbourne..is there anything you would recommend as a substitute?
I like the sound of the thyme too – it’s great to not just restrict them to savouries. How do you make the cardamon sugar – do you just grind a few pods and add the seeds to some caster sugar?
Rosemoor’s an interesting place – I found it a bit stark (in the winter) but still always generates a few gardening ideas
Ooh thyme – very interesting. I’m going to have to give this a try!
Yum! Yum! I love adding unexpected ingredients such as thyme, this sounds scrumptious.
Yum, looks lovely and juicy.
Love the idea of the thyme in there, and the texture looks just perfect.
This looks great but I’m now extremely worried about my cut-out recipe stash glaring at me from the corner of the sitting room – 3 shoe boxes full…how does the man know….?
Apples and thyme, that is a fantastic idea … and the chocolate too ;0)
I don’t think we can ever have too many apple cake recipes.
God this does look very good. You can never go wring with a clutch of apple cake recipes eh? And the fact that this may be the best ever… well, you can thank me later!! ;0) thanks so much for taking part again. It’s lovely. Now, wheres my paracetamol? Xx
I had an apple cake this year where the apples were cooked before baking a cake and they were amazing – am still waiting for the recipe so am happy to hear this sounds like a similar recipe
this looks great!! i am always nervous about baking with herbs…but i trust your “best ever” verdict! 🙂