Dump Cake is probably the easies dessert in the world! And it surely can be very delicious, especially if you skip the store bought cake mix.
Here is a recipe for a wonderful Apple Dump Cake, made completely from scratch, that your whole family will appreciate. Crispy top and juicy fruity bottom: a real pleasure for the palate!
The secrets of this dessert
Preparing Dump Cake from Scratch is not complicated, as you might think. Making the cake mix by yourself is really easy and it will guarantee you a better taste and less unhealthy products in your dessert. Not using a store bought cake mix is actually the first secret of a delicious Dump Cake.
The second secret is: don’t literally “dump” all the ingredients in the pan, otherwise you might end up with sections of dry flour in your cake. You need to cover the fruit completely with the dry ingredients (mixed in advance) and smoothen them on top.
The third step for success of your Dump Cake is to distribute evenly the butter, cut into pieces. This will guarantee you a perfect crust, without holes.
Preparation summary
- Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl
- Peel and cut the apples
- Grease the pan where you will bake the cake
- Mix the apples with some sugar into the baking pan
- Cover the fruit with the dry ingredients and push them into the apples with a spoon, while smoothing out. The idea is the flour to go deep into the apple pieces so that while the cake is baking, no dry areas would remain.
- Arrange the butter, cut into pieces, over the dry ingredients.
- Bake
Is this recipe easy
This recipe is really simple and the preparation takes about 15 minutes. You can serve the dump cake immediately after baking it. It is great to eat it as it is, but could be even better with a scoop of ice cream.
Recipe tips
- The original pan size I used was 8 x 9 inches/ 20 x 24 cm. You can use 7 x 11 inch pan or a pie baking dish that is not too deep. Just make sure that it allows the apples to be well covered by the dry ingredients, to the point of sticking outside.
- Once the butter is heated, use a spoon to spread it evenly around the pan in the oven. That will guarantee you no dry areas would remain in the cake.
- If using very sweet and juicy apples, you can reduce the quantity of the brown sugar mixed with the fruit. Otherwise you may find the cake too sweet.
- On the other hand if using granny smith or similar sweet and sour apples, you can add 1 tablespoon sugar, especially if you like your desserts on the sweet side.
Next time when you need a quick dessert for your family, you can prepare a delicious Apple Dump Cake From Scratch. It is very quick and easy and most probably you have all the ingredients already in your pantry!
If you need more apple desserts for inspiration, here are some you might like:
Easy Honey Apple Yogurt Dessert in a Glass
Kids Friendly Apple Tiramisu
Apple Chocolate Marble Bundt Cake
Apple cake with biscuits
Cheesecake Cupcakes
Apple Dump Cake From Scratch
Ingredients
- 4 medium apples, about 1,5-2 pounds/ 700-900 g
- 1 ½ cup/ 180 g cup all purpose flour
- 1,5 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ cup/ 100 g caster sugar
- 2 tablespoons brown sugar
- 2 teaspoons vanilla sugar, or vanilla extract (see notes)
- ½ teaspoon cinnamon, optional
- ½ cup/ 120 g butter, cold
Instructions
- Grease well a baking dish with 1,5 l capacity (I used 20 x 24 cm or 8 x 9 inch pan). You can use a small pie dish, as long as it is not too deep.
- Preheat the oven to 360° F/ 180° C.
- In a bowl combine flour, caster sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and vanilla sugar. Mix well and set aside.
- Peel and chop the apples into bite sized pieces. Place apples and brown sugar in the pan and mix well with a spoon.
- Cover the apples with the dry mixture. Press the dry ingredients with a spoon into the apples and smooth well the top. The dry mixture should go deep into the apples and the fruit should be evenly covered and sticking outside.
- Slice the butter thinly and arrange the slices close one to another on top of the dry ingredients.
- Bake for about 30 minutes or until a golden brown crust is formed. Keep an eye on the cake in the first 10 minutes: if the butter has not spread around the whole top, use a spoon to spread it. Continue the baking normally afterwards.
- Serve with or without a scoop of vanilla ice cream.
Regina
Hi Dani,
Vanilla sugar instead of vanilla extract–is that to keep it in line with the other dry ingredients? What if I were to mix two teaspoons of extract in the brown and castor sugars before adding to the flour? Would that work, do you think?
Daniela
Hi Regina,
I think it should work with vanilla extract mixed in the caster sugar, before combining the sugar with the rest of the dry ingredients. I will definitely try it out. Thanks for the suggestion!
Bobbie
Good question. I would think that mixing the liquid vanilla in with the sugars would work, but would be nice if the author would reply. 🤷♀️
Daniela
Hi Bobbie,
I had replied below, just it appears as a separate comment for some reason. This sounds like a good idea to me and don’t see a reason why it wouldn’t work.
Jill
This is bar none one of the worst recipes I have ever made.I tried with vanilla,and exact ingredients and more [email protected] I tried 8 times and it was a fail every time so came to the conclusion that it is just a lousy recipe with too many dry ingredients and not enough liquid.. Definately won’t waste any more time,sugar or apples.
Daniela
Hi Jill, I am sorry that you had a negative experience with this recipe. I can assure you that all Dani’s Cookings recipes have been tested multiple times and this one does not make an exception. Furthermore I have just prepared it again today to try understand what could have gone wrong. It turned out as good as always, with no dry areas. So I wouldn’t call it a “lousy” recipe in any case.
Few possible issues:
– The baking dish was too deep and the dry ingredients did not get incorporated well with the apples.
– The butter has not been spread well on top and dry areas remained
I am going to add few more details to the recipe such as recommended pan/dish dimensions to hopefully avoid any possible failures.
In any case, thank you for sharing your experience,
Daniela
Amber
Hi very interesting recipe as there is no liquid and no batter. I definitely would like to try. What is oven temp? 350, 375 or 400 F?
Thanks
Daniela
Hi Amber,
Apologies that I have missed the oven temperature! It is 350 degrees f (180 degrees C).
Thanks for letting me know