“Smells Like Fall” Spice Cake with Maple Brown Butter Glaze

Inside: A quick and easy yogurt spice cake recipe with a heavenly maple brown butter glaze. As the air turns crisp and the leaves begin to change, there’s nothing better than cozying up in your favorite sweatshirt with a good book, a cup of coffee and a thick slice of this “Smells like Fall” spice cake.

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I have a confession to make. I got the inspiration for this cake from my favorite blend of simmering spices. One of my happiest fall traditions is opening up the windows to let in that brisk autumn air, cozying up in a soft, old OSU Buckeyes sweatshirt, and simmering spices to scent the air.

There’s something comforting and delicious about simmering orange peels, cinnamon sticks, cloves, and ginger together. It wafts through the house and makes me so happy.

It’s been a long and hot summer this year. I know there are those that love the hot sun and the long summer days, but I’m not one of them. I love the energy of fall. Leaves starting to turn color, the air growing brisk and fresh. Lazy weekends at home with steamy cups of coffee and your favorite sweatshirt. Football, fire pits, apple-picking. Is there anything better?

Most Sundays, I like to bake something with my family. We often bake a simple French yogurt cake – it’s a recipe I learned from my French teacher while studying abroad one year, and it’s traditionally the first cake that children in France learn to bake. It’s that easy. It’s that foolproof.

And as to be expected of all French pastries – it’s really delicious!

In France, children use a yogurt container to measure out the ingredients, but here in America, I buy giant tubs of yogurt at Costco (because I always have to have yogurt on hand so I can whip up this ridiculously easy Magic Pizza Recipe) so I listed the ingredients in cups.

What I love about French yogurt cake is that the ingredients are very simple – flour, sugar, yogurt, oil, and eggs, which means you can customize it to endless flavor combinations. Blueberry and lemon are delicious in the spring, adding fresh strawberries would be perfect for a summer dessert, or maybe drizzling on some caramel and chocolate for something a bit more decadent.

On my morning walk, I got a glimpse of a brisk autumn breeze and I ran back inside to grab my favorite Ohio State University sweatshirt. After my walk, I wanted to keep the moment going. First, I thought about putting a kettle on the stove and simmering my favorite fall scents.

But then I thought, wait, eating cake is better than simmering spices. Are you with me?

So I decided to make my yogurt cake, but add in those flavors that I love to simmer together – orange peels and cinnamon sticks. Cloves and ginger. And here’s the kicker – not only do you get to EAT this delicious spiced yogurt cake, but you get to SMELL it while it’s cooking, too.

There’s a reason I named this my “Smells Like Fall” spice cake….

Yogurt Spice Cake Tips

Yogurt cakes are my favorite. Not only are they simple, but they’re pretty foolproof.

Adding yogurt to a cake batter does a lot of cool things.

It imparts a tangy, old-fashioned flavor. The creamy consistency of yogurt helps keep baked goods decadently moist. The acidity of yogurt helps to activate leavening agents like baking soda to create a light and fluffy texture. Anytime a recipe calls for sour cream (like sour cream scones or sour cream coffee cake) I opt to sub in some yogurt. For this recipe, I used a plain Greek style yogurt, but any plain variety of yogurt will work in this recipe.

I like to beat the eggs before adding the rest of the ingredients because I think it creates a better a texture.

I used a hand mixer for this easy spice cake but you can also use a simple whisk or stand mixer if you prefer. The batter should be smooth.

For my spice mix, I wanted a mix of clove, ginger, cinnamon and nutmeg.

I used a pumpkin pie mix because it had all of these included, but if you don’t have pumpkin pie mix – feel free to mix together 2 tsp of cinnamon, 1 tsp of ground ginger, 1/2 tsp of ground cloves and 1/4 tsp of nutmeg instead.

When you zest an orange, use a light touch.

You will want to use only the orange part of the peel, not the white pith which can be bitter. I used a tablespoon of fresh orange peel in this recipe – roughly the peel of a medium orange.

Brown Butter Maple Glaze

The real star of the show is the brown butter maple glaze that I poured over the warm cake.

There’s something about browning butter that just takes it to the next level.

I go crazy for brown butter. I use it for everything because it just kicks it up a notch. Why did shrimp in butter when you can dip them in BROWN BUTTER? Why eat buttered noodles when you can have BROWN BUTTERED noodles.

If you’ve never had brown butter – man are you in for a treat.

Browning butter adds a nutty, aromatic and downright delicious flavor to butter. I prefer to use salted butter in this recipe as I like the hint of salt paired with the sweetness from the sugar and maple syrup. If you only have unsalted butter on hand, add in 1/4 tsp of salt to your butter as you brown it.

The trick with browning is butter is to use a light colored pot – like stainless steel, so you can easily tell when the butter is browned. It will seem like it’s not browning at all and then bam it’s ready and if you wait even a moment longer, it’ll be too dark.

My advice – have a small glass bowl waiting to the side, so as soon as it starts to turn a golden brown color, you can pour it into the glass bowl so it stops cooking. I just hang out and keep an eye on my butter as it browns, lightly stirring and scraping the sides of the pot with a rubber spatula. It won’t take long.

You’ll want to cool the browned butter slightly before mixing up the maple brown butter glaze.

 

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