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4.75 from 85 votes

Apple Dump Cake Recipe- made from scratch!

Apple Dump Cake is an easy dessert that combines gooey cinnamon apples with a buttery crunchy topping! Serve warm with milk or ice cream for a simple, irresistible fall dessert.
Prep Time10 minutes
Cook Time50 minutes
1 hour
Course: Dessert
Cuisine: American
Servings: 12 people
Author: Lydia @ ThriftyFrugalMom.com

Ingredients

Apple Mixture

  • 5 cups apples, peeled and cut into 1 in. pieces
  • 1 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/4 tsp. nutmeg
  • 2 tbsp. sugar
  • 2 tsp. vanilla

Topping

  • 2 1/3 cups flour
  • 1 1/4 cups sugar
  • 1 tbsp. baking powder
  • 3/4 tsp. salt
  • 3/4 to 1 cup butter, melted (see Notes below)

Instructions

  • Combine cinnamon, nutmeg, sugar and vanilla; add to apples and mix well.  Spread into a greased 9x13 baking dish.
  • Using the same bowl, make the topping by combining the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt.  Pour over top of the apple mixture and spread it out evenly.  
  • Pour melted butter all over the top of the cake. Tilt the pan if necessary to get the butter to cover as much of the surface of the cake as possible.
  • Bake at 350° for 45 to 50 minutes until bubbly and lightly browned.
  • Eat warm or cold as is or serve with milk, whipped cream or ice cream.

Notes

Freezing: This recipe won't freeze well because the topping will get soggy. But you can freeze the apple mixture to speed up the process of making the recipe later. Simply mix the ingredients together, put it all into a gallon freezer bag and lay flat to freeze. When you are ready to use, dump tje mixture out into your baking dish (no need to thaw!), spread it out as evenly as you can (should be easy to break pieces apart) and then add your topping and bake as usual. 
Variations:
  • Drizzle caramel syrup over the top when ready to serve for a Caramel Apple Dump Cake.
  • You can top the cake with ½ to ¾ c. chopped pecans.  I would wait to add them until the last 10 minutes of baking to keep them from getting burnt.
Some readers have said that they struggled to get the butter to cover all the dry cake mix topping. So I have changed the recipe to say ¾ to 1 cup butter. Use 1 c. if you are concerned that the lesser amount won't cover all your cake mix.