An Apple A Day...
 After the fresh apple harvest, Kentucky cooks use dried
apples to make their favorite old-fashioned desserts.
The dried apple stack cake still is considered a special
occasion dessert because it takes time and skill to
make the ten-layer cake.
Mark F. Sohn of Pikeville wrote in Appalachian Home
Cooking, History, Culture, & Recipes
(The University Press of Kentucky, $26) that the origins of the stack cake recipe
are difficult to trace, but some food historians say that James Harrod, the colonist
and farmer who founded Harrodsburg in 1774, brought the stack cake to Kentucky
from his home in Pennsylvania. “While Harrod may have brought the first
stack cake to Kentucky, the cake could not have been common until more than 100
years later when flour became readily available,” Sohn said.
The Appalachian stack cake “was once the standard by which cooks all along
the Blue Ridge of the Appalachian Mountains were measured,” said Damon
Lee Fowler, author of New Southern Baking. “It had all but disappeared
from Southern tables, but in recent years, it has made a comeback among both
home cooks and professional pastry chefs whose exploration of old traditions
has sparked a renewed interest in regional dishes like this one.”
The dried apple stack cake is called by different names including apple stack
cake, Confederate old-fashioned stack cake, stackcake, and Kentucky pioneer washday
cake, said Sidney Saylor Farr, author of More Than Moonshine: Appalachian Recipes
and Recollections. All were made using two constant ingredients: ginger and sweet
sorghum molasses.
While sorghum molasses was considered not suitable in
most cakes and pies, it worked very well in the stack
cake, Farr said.
Sometimes cooks varied the amount of
sweetening by adding brown sugar to the sorghum molasses
(1⁄2 cup sugar
to 1⁄3 cup molasses).
The original recipe is a long, tedious process (taking as much as three
hours to assemble). Some cooks just use regular cake layers and plain applesauce
or apple butter, or a combination of both, as the filling between the layers.
While stack cake made this way may be tasty, there is no comparison between
applesauce or apple butter and the strong apple flavor that dried apples
give.
How to dry apples
One method of preserving foods in Appalachia is by air and sun drying.
After coring and peeling, apples are cut in half then cut into quarters.
Each quarter is cut into two or three thin slices. When the apples are
ready, they are spread on a large white cloth and placed on top of a shed
or other flat area to dry in the sun. A fine wire screen put over them
kept out flies and bugs. This method is chancy because of the threat of
rain. However, apple slices can be dried near a wood-burning stove, in
a sunny window, or in the oven at a low temperature. They can also be dried
by stringing the slices with a needle and stout thread and hanging them
up to dry. The apple slices shrivel and turn brown. When completely dry
they are stored in cloth bags, glass canning jars, or the freezer.
Cooked dried apples
Put 1 pound apples in heavy pan and cover with cold water.
You may need to add water several times to keep apples
from sticking to pan. Cook until soft enough to mash.
While still hot, mash apples and add 1 cup brown sugar,
1 cup white sugar, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, 1⁄4 teaspoon
cloves, and 1 teaspoon allspice.
Today different versions of the stack cake are found in recipe collections
and cookbooks, Farr said, but mountain cooks still prefer the old-fashioned
recipes that come down through generations of mountain cooks.
“I collected the following recipe from Mrs. Elmer Gabbard who, with her
husband, founded the Buckhorn Center and Orphanage, and worked there many years.
She said the recipe she gave me had been handed down in her family for generations,” Farr
said.
Dried apple stack cake
1⁄2 cup shortening
1⁄2 cup sugar
1 egg, well beaten
1⁄3 cup molasses
1⁄2 cup buttermilk
3 1⁄2 cups flour
1⁄2 teaspoon soda
1⁄2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ginger
1 teaspoon vanilla
Cooked dried apples
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cream shortening and sugar;
add beaten egg, molasses, buttermilk, and mix well. Sift
flour, soda, salt, and ginger into a big mixing bowl.
Make hole in center of dry ingredients and pour in creamed
mix, stirring until well blended. Add vanilla, stir well,
and roll out dough as you would for a piecrust. Cut to
fit 9-inch pan or cast-iron skillet (this amount of dough
will make 7 layers). Bake layers for 10 to 12 minutes, or until lightly browned.
When cool, stack layers with spiced, sweetened old-fashioned dried apples. Spread
between layers and smooth around sides and top. Sprinkle with powdered sugar,
if desired, or beat egg whites into a meringue and spread on outside of cake.
You may brown the meringue if desired. Prepare cake at least a day before serving
it and put in refrigerator (it will keep several days, if necessary, in a cool
place). To serve, slice into very thin layers.
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