Gingerbread Apple Cake

This gingerbread apple cake delivers deep molasses flavor and warm spice in every bite. A homemade gingerbread spice blend and buttermilk keep the crumb tender and moist for days.

This gingerbread apple cake is everything I love about fall baking: warmly spiced, packed with apple flavor, and impossibly moist. The creamed-butter base gives it a tender, light crumb, and the generous cinnamon-sugar topping means it doesn’t even need frosting—unless you want to take it over the top! It’s just as at home on a holiday table as it is with a mug of afternoon tea.

If you love the flavor of this cake, my American gingerbread cake leans into the molasses and spice without the apple, or you can go all apple and make this French apple cake!

Ingredients & Substitutions

• Gingerbread Spice Mix: This layered blend reinforces and harmonizes the individual spices already in the batter, producing a more complex gingerbread character rather than a single-note cake. If you prefer not to mix your own, a store-bought blend works, but homemade is noticeably better in both punch and balance. If you love how warm spices and molasses showcase ginger’s flavor on its own, my gingerbread blondies are a great next bake!
• Baking Powder and Baking Soda: These two work together. The baking soda reacts with the acid in the molasses and buttermilk to provide lift and browning, while the baking powder provides a reliable, even rise that does not depend solely on that acidity.
• Unsalted Butter, Room Temperature: Butter is creamed with sugar to incorporate air, which is the foundation of this cake’s soft, tender crumb.
• Granulated Sugar: Sugar sweetens and creates a fine crumb by interfering with gluten development. It also balances the bitterness and intensity of the molasses and the heat of the spices.
• Molasses: Molasses provides the defining gingerbread flavor along with deep color and lasting moisture. Use regular or original molasses, not blackstrap. Blackstrap is harsher and far more bitter, and it will throw off the entire balance of the cake.
• Low Fat Buttermilk, Room Temperature: Buttermilk adds gentle tang that brightens the spices and keeps the crumb tender. If you don’t have buttermilk, you can make some with 1 cup milk and 1 tablespoon lemon juice. Allow it to sit for a few minutes before using.
• Apples, Finely Diced: The apples contribute pockets of juiciness and subtle fruit sweetness that play beautifully against the gingerbread spices. Dice them small so they soften completely during baking and distribute evenly through the crumb without sinking or creating wet pockets just in this [apple bread!]
• Granulated Sugar and Cinnamon, for Topping: The sugar caramelizes lightly in the oven, creating a delicate, crunchy crust on the surface. The cinnamon combines with it to create a distinct, spiced top layer that contrasts with the soft interior.
• Cream Cheese, Brick-Style, Full Fat: Cream cheese forms the base of a stable, tangy frosting that complements the cake’s warm spices and sweetness. Brick-style, full-fat is essential here. Tub cream cheese and low-fat versions have a higher moisture content, and the frosting will turn soft and runny.
• Confectioners’ Sugar: Confectioners’ sugar sweetens and thickens the frosting while dissolving seamlessly into the cream cheese and butter. The restrained amount keeps the frosting balanced, so the tang and the spices stay prominent.

See the recipe card for full information on ingredients and quantities.

Variations on This Gingerbread Apple Cake

• Layer Cake. Divide the batter between two 8- or 9-inch round pans and start checking for doneness at 18 minutes, since round layers bake a little faster than a sheet cake.
• Different Fruit! Try this cake with diced pears, cranberries, cherries, or figs! You could also make a jam and swirl it into the cake if you prefer! Or make this easy apple compote!
• Add some additional flavors! Fold in some toasted pecans or walnuts for added crunch. You could also add some white or dark chocolate!

Professional Tips

• Do not overbake. Bake at 325°F in convection or 350°F in conventional, and start checking at 22 minutes. Mine was slightly over at 25 minutes, and the difference was noticeable, so pull the cake the moment a skewer comes out with moist crumbs rather than wet batter.
• Dice the apples small. Large chunks create wet pockets in the crumb and sink unevenly during baking. Fine dice means they soften completely and distribute throughout every slice.
• Cool the cake completely before frosting. A warm cake will melt the cream cheese frosting on contact, which I have learned more than once. Patience here protects the texture of both the frosting and the crumb beneath it.

How to Make Gingerbread Apple Cake

This cake comes together in stages, so read through the steps once before you start. Further details and measurements can be found in the recipe card below.

Step 1: Prepare the pan and preheat the oven. Preheat to 325°F convection or 350°F conventional. Spray a 9×13-inch pan or two 9-inch round cake pans with nonstick cooking spray and line the bottom with parchment paper.

Step 2: Mix the spices and cinnamon sugar topping. In a small bowl, whisk all the spices together for the gingerbread spice mix. In a separate small bowl, combine the granulated sugar and cinnamon for the topping. Set both aside. (photo 1).

Make the Batter

Step 3: Whisk the dry ingredients. Whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and gingerbread spice mix in a bowl, then set aside. The mixture will smell warm and intensely spiced. (photo 1).

Step 4: Cream the butter, sugar, and molasses. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter, sugar, and molasses together until no pieces of butter remain. The mixture will look dark and slightly sticky from the molasses, rather than pale and fluffy like plain creamed butter. (photo 2)

Make sure you scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl. Butter likes to hang out there and not get incorporated. And once you add the eggs, it will be very hard to get the butter to incorporate.

Step 5: Add the eggs one at a time. Add the eggs one at a time, scraping down the bowl and beating well between each addition. (photos 3 &4 above).

After the last egg, the batter should have the consistency of smooth peanut butter, thick and cohesive with a slight sheen. If it looks broken or curdled after an early egg, keep beating — it will come back together as the remaining eggs go in.

Step 6: Reduce the mixer speed to low and add the dry ingredients and buttermilk in alternating additions, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients. Mix until just about combined — you will still see a few streaks of flour, and that is fine. Add the chopped apples and finish mixing by hand with a rubber spatula, folding until the flour disappears and the apples are evenly distributed. Finishing by hand prevents overmixing, which would tighten the crumb. (photos 5-8).

Step 7: Transfer the batter and add the topping. Spread the batter into the prepared pan or divide it evenly between the two round pans. Sprinkle the cinnamon sugar topping generously and evenly over the surface; use all of it. It forms a lightly crisp, caramelized layer on top as the cake bakes, which I love. (photos 9&10 ).

Bake the cake

Step 8: Bake for 22 to 23 minutes. Start checking at 22 minutes. The edges will have pulled slightly from the pan, and the top will feel just set when you press it lightly in the center. Mine went to 25 minutes once and was slightly overdone. The cinnamon sugar crust will look deeply golden, and the cake beneath it will still look a touch soft in the center, but that is the right moment to pull it.

If you are baking in two 9-inch round pans, start checking for doneness at 18 minutes. Round cakes bake faster than a single sheet and will be done a few minutes earlier.

Step 9: Cool the cake completely. Let the cake cool in the pan on a wire rack until fully cool before frosting. The molasses and apples hold moisture well, so the cake will stay tender as it sits.

Frost and Serve

Step 10: Make the cream cheese buttercream frosting. Beat the cream cheese and butter together until smooth with no lumps remaining. Add the confectioners’ sugar and beat until smooth and cohesive. Add the vanilla extract and taste — add a little more if you want a brighter finish. (photos 11&12).

Step 11: Spread the frosting over the fully cooled cake in an even layer. For a sheet cake, a generous swooping layer works beautifully. For a layer cake, spread frosting between the layers and over the top and sides. Slice and serve at room temperature. (photo 13&14).

Recipe FAQs

Before You Go

If this gingerbread apple cake earned a spot in your rotation, there is plenty more where that came from. Browse all my Cake Recipes or make these soft gingerbread cookies next!