Valentines Day brings to mind chocolate candies and those little candy hearts that have writing on them. For me it also brings to mind the dessert that is most often talked about in Appalachia: Apple Stack Cake.
Fellow blogger, Dave Tabler covered much of the history of Apple Stack Cake on his site Appalachian History:
At holidays and weddings, early mountain settlers traditionally served stack cake in lieu of more fancy, and costly, cakes. Neighbors would each bring a layer of the cake to the bride’s family, which they spread with apple filling as they arrived. It was said that the number of cake layers the bride got determined how popular she was.
Kentucky lays claim to originating the dessert via Kentucky pioneer washday cake. “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,” observes Mark F. Sohn in Appalachian Home Cooking: History, Culture, and Recipes. “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.” Tennessee proudly points to Tennessee stack cake as the first, but in fact variations of the cake abound throughout the region.
On the website, GILT Taste, Stella Parks discusses an interesting phenomenon regarding the apple stack cake recipe. The first widely published recipe for the cake appeared in 1980-however historians know the cake has been around much longer than the year 1980. Regarding the absence of published recipes Ms. Parks wrote:
Some more digging in cookbooks, though, and I found that while apple stack cake may not have appeared in print before the 1980s, it may be in part because, like the brides who served it at their infares, it too changed its name. In those early years, it appeared in cookbooks everywhere under the guise of “apple short cake.” Helen M. Robinson’s The Practical Cook Book, published in 1864, describes apple short cake as a huge biscuit wheel, split in two and filled with stewed apples; a cro-magnon sort of stack cake, but still. By 1877‘s The Cultivator & Country Gentleman, Volume 42, it had evolved into two biscuit wheels, split, brushed with melted butter, filled with homemade apple jam, stacked, sprinkled with nutmeg, and served warm with fresh sweet cream poured over the top. (A preparation known in the trade as, “holy mother of yum.”)
A decade later, the ghost of Alvin Wood Chase would push apple short cake toward its final incarnation. Chase, last seen elucidating the origins of red velvet cake, died three years before the publication of his Third, Last, and Complete Receipt Book and Household Physician, but in it he includes a “receipt” for Apple Short Cake. Where previous recipes for apple short cake revolved around simple buttermilk biscuits, Chase’s “sweet short cake” contained both sugar and egg, marking the first step of apple short cake’s transformation into a proper cake.
Ms. Parks also points out that while the recipe for apple stack cake wasn’t popular enough to appear in a nationally published cookbook till 1980, it was published in literally hundreds of community or church type cookbooks from all areas of Appalachia over the years preceding 1980.
Since I first learned the history of Apple Stack Cake I’ve heard a few folks say the story of folks bringing a layer with them to a wedding is pure myth and never actually happened. But I’ve read first hand accounts of folks who say it most certainly did happen 🙂
I like to think folks sharing what they had to make a wedding cake did happen.
I see Apple Stack Cake as a cake of true love.
Love because it symbolized a holy union between a loving couple.
Love because the layers were made by people who wanted the loving couple to get a good start on marriage.
Love because for years the recipe was saved and handed down from one generation to the next even though the culinary world at large wasn’t much interested in it.
Love because the cake has defined not only marriages in Appalachia, but also Christmas, Thanksgiving, birthdays, and other family celebrations for many generations.
Here’s a link to the Apple Stack Cake recipe I use. The recipe will be one of the many wonderful recipes in mine and Jim Casada’s new cookbook: “Celebrating Southern Appalachian Food Recipes & Stories from Mountain Kitchens.” The cookbook will be out in May so be on the lookout for more information about it in the coming weeks.
Last night’s video: Exciting Weekend: Clearing off the Bank & Cleaning out Garden Beds.
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I lost my dad in 2022 at 87. He had told me about apple stack cakes for years. A few years I ago I made one at Christmas and took it to a family gathering. He was so proud of me for making it and told everyone it was a good as the ones his grandmother had made. What a great memory. Thanks for sharing yours.
Ohhh, that’s such a sweet memory. A family branch off of my mom’s family had a reunion, she and her siblings were invited. One Aunt talked about my grandmother’s caramel pie, so I found a recipe like my grandmother’s and made the pie. My Aunt told me,she didn’t know how I found her mother’s recipe,but that it tasted just like her mother’s. It gave me a wonderful feeling, my heart was just overloading with love. I had created something that my Aunt enjoyed as a child.
Sharon Lisman Baxter
One other thing, the use of the word “receipt” by Dr. Chase as quoted by Stella Parks! When I was in grade school we learned that “receipt” was an alternant spelling for “recipe”. I don’t remember which teacher taught us that or which grade we were in but I do remember having to learn both.
One more other thing. My mother made a “stack pie” make from biscuits that were split open and laid in rings around a plate and stacked in layers with spiced apple sauce between them. The writings above seem to describe something similar.
Dolly Parton has a receipt for an Apple Stack Pie that looks like your Apple Stack Cake although its layers are thicker. https://www.punchfork.com/recipe/Dolly-Partons-Apple-Stack-Pie-Delish Maybe the settlers also called it a “pie” instead of a “cake”.
There is a sentence in John F. Sohns observations that confuses me. “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.” Is he saying that there was no flour in Kentucky in 1774? I can’t attest to Kentucky in particular but wheat and wheat flour came to America with the first settlers in the 1600s. Baking powder, which makes modern cakes rise more, did not come into use until the mid 1800s but this recipe doesn’t call for it. It is intended to be a thin dense moist cake similar to a modern fruit cake without the fruit incorporated into the batter.
If Mr. Sohn had stated that apples were not available in Kentucky in 1774 it would be more believable. John Chapman (Johnny Appleseed) 1774-1845 was noted for spreading apples to the lands west of the mountains. He wasn’t the only one to carry apples over the mountains but he was the most notable.
It used to be “I read it in a book”! Now it it’s “I Googled it!” Well I’m here to tell you books are often wrong! And, Google is more often wrong.
Although I have never eaten apple stack cake, I first heard about this cake from my grandmother. Even though she dried apples for applejacks, she never made this cake, but she did mention it and she said this was a cake that originated in Appalachia and when someone got married, folks would bring a layer to the wedding, and the more layers, the more luck the couple would have. I tend to believe this tradition was true. Tipper, I have watched your video and I think it would be a wonderful cake to make. Going to have to try it!! Thanks for all the information about it. Looking forward also to the cookbook!!! Have a great day everyone!!
The first time I ever tried Apple Stack Cake was when I about 17 yrs old and dating, my now husband, at his Granny J’s Christmas gathering. I absolutely loved it! It was the best apple cake I’d ever tasted and never seen one with so many layers. His Granny was suppose to give me her recipe, but sadly she never wrote it out. My mother in-law never made them herself, so my hopes of ever getting the recipe died too. In 2010 I came across the recipe for stack cake on Pinterest. I made it for a party I was hosting and everyone loved it. I had not saved it so now don’t know which recipe it was that I used back then. I didn’t make it again till 2021, but used a recipe my mother in-law gave me that was her aunt’s recipe she had received. That recipe made a lot of stacks and used almost all the pints of applesauce I had canned that year. Sadly, it tasted terrible. I was so disappointed and not sure what I did wrong, because my applesauce was delicious, so it had to be something in the cakes recipe that I messed up. Anyway, I saw your video Tipper on making the stack cake and saved the recipe you shared. I haven’t made your recipe yet, but plan too. I’m just hoping I don’t mess it up when I do make it….I’ll let you know when I do finally make it.
My maternal grandmother made dried apple stack cake as long as I remember, at least back to the 1950’s and probably long before. She just used her tea cake (basic sugar cookie) recipe and cut out layers using a “dinner plate” as you do with a pan. I don’t know if she even had a recipe for the dried apple filling. It was basically the same as your recipe but I don’t remember the molasses/sorghum in it. It was easy but time consuming, especially considering she picked, peeled and dried the apples. I don’t remember that it was served any one time more than others unless maybe at Christmas. I never heard of the sharing of layers at a wedding until just a few years ago and not long after that I heard that the custom was a myth. I’ve never heard nor read of any personal experience of that happening but I see how it could. It seems it would be hard for each person to know what size to make the layers. My sister and I made tea cakes and spread dried apple filling inside like a sandwich to make them small enough to be easy to serve. It seems the trick is to make the filling just thick enough that the cookie layers get soaked with flavor but not enough to crumble in the hand. Now I’m hungry for apple stack cake!!!
Apple stack cake is iconic of Appalachia to me. I posted here in 2019 about my Grandma made them. The dried apples were always very dark brown and the cake layers medium brown for a stripedy look. She used apples she had picked, peeled, cored, sliced and dried herself. I was too busy eating to ever even think of counting layers. I never heard (or at least don’t remember) any folk traditions about the cake. It would be way too much cake for us two. I wish I knew where I could get a slice.
On another related subject, have you thought of taking pre-order on the cookbook? Jim would know but I think it might help about getting the best price on printing. Just a thought for what it’s worth. We readers may want you to sign them for us to.
Ron-You can pre-Jim is offering a pre-order for the book 🙂
I do remember my Ma Skinner making this apple stack cake. She also made a sweet ‘tater stacked custard. Why she called it custard, I don’t know, but this stacked dessert was common at her house. She would use biscuit dough and roll it thin, spread it with mashed sweet potato filling made with egg, sugar, and nutmeg. She would bake several and then stack them together sprinkling sugar between the layers. She may have used the idea from the apple stack cake. I have not seen this since she made it, but I sure do remember how good it was. I suppose it was a cross between a cake and pie.
My ex-mother-in-law took a stack cake to a church function years ago that was such a big hit folks started asking her to bake one for them. I don’t remember how much she was paid per cake but it was an unheard-of price when she started selling them back in the 80s. It was not my favorite cake so I never asked for her recipe.
I’m glad to read the information on apple stack cake but the best part was the info that the collaboration cookbook between you and Jim Casada will soon be available. That is surely better than a wonderful stack cake since – give a man a fish and he will eat a meal but teach a man to fish and he will eat a lifetime. YEA! for a new cookbook.
Good morning Mrs Tipper.
I wonder if I could make the layers in a cast iron skillet? Do you think that would work? I am definitely going to get one made. I appreciate how you bring back mountain ways. Blessings.
Betty-many people use a cast iron pan 🙂
My wife has made it twice and I love it. It gets sweeter day after day! Oh my I’m a poet!
I love apple stack cake, even if it’s origin is shrouded in mystery.
Tipper–One bit of folklore my Grandma Minnie often mentioned in connection with stack cake was that a proper one should have seven layers. Presumably that was because seven was considered a lucky number.
Number of layers aside, her thoughts on stack cakes were lucky indeed for me. She knew I loved them and even when I was well into adulthood and married, she always had one made when she knew I was coming home. I never think of her without thinking of stack cake.
I don’t think I have ever ate an apple stack cake and don’t remember ever seeing one at any weddings or dinners. My wife’s aunt was known for making a 8-10 thin layer (less than 1in. thick) chocolate layer cake. I am not much for cakes except for a good pound cake especially if it is a raisin pound cake. I love those deep dish pies. Mother and grandmother made deep dish pies with dumplings in them in deep sided enamel pans that sure meant love to me. I haven’t had one like that in a long time. I know my comment is not going along with today’s post but those pies sure did mean love to me- at least I loved them. In 1973 I gave my girlfriend and later my wife a huge heart shaped box of valentine candy that cost about $25 back then at Sky City- similar to Kmart. Back then she didn’t weigh 95lbs with her pants pockets full of rocks. Since joining the BP&A, I have gain 10lbs just from reading Tipper’s post about food. Tipper did you get your snow this weekend? There is a very heavy frost here this morning, from the way the cars and yards look, you would think we had a dusting or skiff here.
Randy-no snow. But I have a big frost this morning too 🙂
Look at your hands in the picture. Your excited to get into that cake and it certainly is beautiful. It’s a lovely cake, for sure! Good job Tipper!
Wow, what a read and what a lesson. I did watch your video making that wonderful cake and have decided to dry some apples and make that wonderful dish one day. I don’t think applesauce would do the trick. God Bless and Happy Valentine’s Day to morrow.
We are all looking forward to your cookbook!!!! I enjoyed this post!
Donna. : )