The Tipsy Orchard Cake

A simple but impressive mix-up

This is partly a recipe and partly an encouragement to play with your food.

Yes, I know you were told not to do that when you were little. But you’re a grown-up now and cleaning up after yourself and it’s fun to play with flavors! Also, doing something like this takes a simple cake and makes it into an entirely different creature. Finally, and need I say more? It’s dead simple to do something like this. Because the first ingredient isn’t a single thing. In the baking world if flour is an atom, the box baking mix is a complex molecular compound.

I was trying to come up with a dessert, hadn’t been feeling well, and didn’t want to do a whole thing from scratch. Really, though, this was about me going ‘oh, that will work with this, and I could add that…’

Get confident with what flavors play nicely with others, be creative in the kitchen, and you’ll get results that may surprise you. I can remember being told you could doctor a cake mix, and for some reason at that point in my teens this hadn’t ever occurred to me to try - it broke the paradigm and I never looked back after I escaped the box recipe!

The Tipsy Orchard Cake

Preheat oven to 350F

• 1 box spice cake mix

• 2 tsp pumpkin pie spice¹

• 3 large (or 4 pullet) eggs

• 1 c white wine (I had pinot grigot)

• 1/4 c oil (use what you have! melt butter, even)

For filling and frosting:

• 1 c apple butter (homemade. Seriously, yes this matters)

• 1 can cream cheese frosting

• 1/4 c toasted unsweetened coconut shreds

• Dried rose petals

Grease two 9” round cake pans (you can also use 8” and the layers will be thicker). I like to line them with a parchment paper round, as well. So easy to get the cake out!

Set the pans aside while the oven is preheating and in a mixing bowl beat together the oil, eggs, wine, and spices. I used wine I’d opened for a chicken dish, and was looking for a way to use up (not much of a drinker here) so I suspect any white wine would work just fine here. Pour in the spice cake mix, beat just until well combined. Pour the batter into the two cake pans, as evenly separated as you can manage. I’m not fussy about this, and you’ll find that with practice you’ll get it really close.

Bake for about 15-20 minutes if in metal 9” round pans. If you are using a different pan you may need to adjust the time, a smaller round with deeper batter will need a little longer, for instance. Use a tester or a toothpick and when it comes out cleanly you’re done.

Turn the cakes out on a cooling rack and allow to cool.

For the frosting and filling I started with a little dam of frosting piped around the bottom layer, as my apple butter might have been runny enough to flow off. Store-bought apple butter is bland and if that’s all you have use some other jam or something here instead. Place the top layer on, and frost just the top of the cake. I wound up with frosting left over I’ll use elsewhere, we all prefer the frosting not be too thick, it can overwhelm the cake. Sprinkle on your toasted coconut for a little decoration and flavor. The dried rose petals were just for pretty and you can totally leave them off.

et voila!

The apple butter will soak into the cake nicely and make it moister. The apple and the wine really play well together. The added spices give this cake mix real bite, which in my opinion it needs.

My rule of thumb is to add flavor in any way I can without disrupting the formula. A box cake mix is great, because they are going to be reliable almost every time when you follow directions. However, you can and should! play with them. Instead of water, what can you use that adds flavor? Wine, coffee, tea, juice, you name it. You can add a little espresso powder to a chocolate cake to boost the chocolatey taste without having it taste like coffee - unless you want that, in which case add a tablespoonful instead of a teaspoon! Here I used what I had on hand to dress up the cake. It’s a fun game to play when you have a pantry full of oddments, as I do. Also, it uses things up that you only have a bit of, which is useful.

So! Have fun with your food! And if you are looking for a smash hit cake, make this one for your next gathering. As you can see, there wasn’t much left for me to photograph.

1. Look, there’s no pumpkin in this spice blend. If it makes you happy call it apple pie spice to coordinate with the apple-centric theme of this cake.