By October and the world is cooperating fully with the season: cold morning runs, leaves starting to show, the specific pleasure of a sweater that has not been worn in six months feeling like seeing an old friend. I have the slow cooker on a rotation again. I am baking bread on Sundays. We have the heat on in the evenings, which Ryan runs cold and I run warm and we have been negotiating thermostat settings since we moved in together and we have reached what I consider a diplomatic solution (67 degrees, I wear a sweater, he does not comment on the sweater).
Apple butter season is fully here — I made two batches this week, one for us and one for Babcia Rose, who I dropped off at her place Saturday. She tasted it and was quiet for a moment and said it needed more cinnamon. I said I had used twice what the recipe called for. She said she noticed and it still needed more. I went home and added the note to the recipe. Next batch: more cinnamon. This is how the recipe improves.
School is in good mid-October stride, which means: routines fully established, the first IEP reviews happening, the parents I have built relationships with starting to feel like partners rather than an anxious unknown. I have a parent, I will call her Mrs. H, who called me in September convinced her son was not making progress. I invited her to observe last week. She sat in the back and watched him do his full morning routine independently, including hanging up his backpack and checking his visual schedule, and she cried quietly the whole time. That is the thing. That right there.
The blog post this week is apple butter with the note that more cinnamon is always the answer, which I borrowed from Babcia Rose and gave her credit for. My readers love Babcia Rose. They have been following her in the margins of my posts for three years and she has no idea and would not care and also would be pleased.
After two batches of apple butter this week and Babcia Rose’s standing reminder that more cinnamon is always the answer, I wanted to keep the applesauce momentum going in a different direction — something the slow weeks of mid-October feel like they deserve. This chocolate chip applesauce snack cake is exactly that: unfussy, warmly spiced, the kind of thing you bake on a Sunday while the bread is rising and the slow cooker is doing its thing. I doubled the cinnamon. You already know.
Chocolate Chip Applesauce Snack Cake
Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cook Time: 35 minutes | Total Time: 45 minutes | Servings: 16
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon (Babcia Rose says more — use 2 teaspoons)
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1 cup unsweetened applesauce
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 2 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips, divided
Instructions
- Preheat. Heat oven to 350°F. Grease a 9x13-inch baking pan and set aside.
- Mix dry ingredients. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and nutmeg until combined.
- Combine wet ingredients. In a separate medium bowl, whisk together applesauce, vegetable oil, eggs, and vanilla extract until smooth.
- Bring it together. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and stir gently until just combined — do not overmix. Fold in 3/4 cup of the chocolate chips.
- Pan and top. Spread the batter evenly into the prepared pan. Scatter the remaining 1/4 cup chocolate chips over the top.
- Bake. Bake for 30–35 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean and the edges are just pulling away from the pan.
- Cool and slice. Let the cake cool in the pan for at least 15 minutes before slicing into squares and serving.
Nutrition (per serving)
Calories: 218 | Protein: 3g | Fat: 10g | Carbs: 31g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 105mg