Tennessee Mountain Stack Cake: USA #160

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 Tennessee Mountain Stack Cake: USA #160

This cake is also known an Apple Stack Cake. It’s a labor intensive cake, so make sure you set aside enough time to make it. It also has to be refrigerated over night or longer before serving. The dough is rolled out like a cookie. It bakes into a hard disk that is then saturated with dried apples that have been reconstituted with spices and sugar. 

Ingredients:

DRY INGREDIENTS:

4-1/2 c. All-purpose flour

1 tsp. Salt

1/2 tsp. Baking soda

1 tsp. Baking powder

1/4 tsp. Cinnamon

CREAMING INGREDIENTS:

1-1/2 sticks unsalted butter

1-1/4c granulated sugar

3/4 c. Molasses

2 eggs

1/2 c. Buttermilk

FOR THE DRIED APPLE FILLING:

8-12 c. Dried apples

4 c. Granulated sugar

2 tsp. Cinnamon

2 tsp. Nutmeg

2 T. Molasses

3 c. Water 

FOR SERVING:

Confectioners’ sugar 

  1. Preheat oven 350F and place the rack in the middle position.
  2. Combine the dry ingredients in a bowl and whisk to combine. Set aside.
  3. Combine the butter and sugar in the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and mix on medium speed until wet and grainy.
  4. Add the molasses.  Scrape the sides of the bowl with a flexible spatula to get all of the molasses into the mixture.
  5. Add the eggs one at a time.  Scrape all the way to the bottom of the bowl and mix on low speed.
  6. Alternately add the buttermilk and the dry mixture about a quarter at a time.  Stop the mixer to scrape the bowl and turn it on again on low speed for about 10 seconds.  the mixture should be stiff like a soft cookie dough.
  7. Shape the dough into a ball and wrap it in plastic wrap.  Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
  8. Divide the dough into 6-8 equal portions and place each one on a round piece of parchment paper a little larger than a 9 inch cake pan.  Roll out the dough to the size of the parchment.  Place the cake pan over the disk and trim away the excess around the edge.
  9. Leaving the parchment paper underneath, lift the disks onto baking sheets and bake them for approximately 10 minutes, or until the top surface appears dry and a wooden skewer inserted in the center comes out clean.
  10. Slide the disks off the baking sheet onto a flat surface to cool.
  11. To make the filling, combine all the ingredients in a large, heavy-bottom saucepan and bring to a light simmer.  Immediately transfer to the work bowl of a food processor fitted with the steel blade and pulse into a thick paste.
  12. To assemble the cake, spread about 1 cup of the filling onto each layer, taking care to center each disk on top of the one beneath it.  Repeat until all the layers are used.  Do not put apple filling on the top layer.  Dust with confectioners’ sugar and serve chilled.
Results:  I originally was going to make a 1/2 measure of this cake.  Then we had company visiting so I made a full measure. I’m so glad I did because it’s delicious, plus if you’re going to go through all this work you might as well make it larger.  However, holy cow this took a lot of time. Who has 6-8 nine -inch pans?? Not I. So, I put 2 rounds of dough on a cookie sheet at a time. I ended up with 7 layers. I bought the dried apples at Whole Foods. I couldn’t find them at our local grocery store. 
Bottom Line: A perfect cake for the fall season. Will I make it again? Probably not. Even though it was very good, it was just too much work.

Please share this blog with family and friends, especially Tennesseans. Thanks 

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