An Apple (Cake) a Day...

Apple (Cake) a Day Transcript

Kristen I am so excited about this week's episode oh really why is that while we are highlighting Mary's Memo it is not for the recipe instead we're going to focus on a lifestyle tip that inspired a recipe so I guess that you could say today we're going with a theme ooh I love a good theme what is it it's apples oh you mean like an apple a day keeps the doctor away oh exactly but better today it's an apple cake a day I love that let's do it welcome to mom's wooden spoon get your apron on and your fanny flicker ready as we cook up some nostalgia ooh yummy hi this is Carrie and this is Kristen and welcome to National Apple Month woo hoo we love apples so looking through Mary's Memo we are going to deviate a little bit and we're going to do a recipe that is not included in a memo but it is inspired by the words of Mary it definitely is and it is the best recipe ever oh I'm so excited about the recipe I can't even tell you okay so the Mary's Memo we're working off of is from March 21st of 1977 and the reason that we picked this one is because it starts with an apple a day may keep pounds away ooh I could use some of that we decided to change it up a little to an apple cake a day um yeah which is not going to keep pounds away it will not but it'll taste so much better it'll make me so happy it brings back such great memories so the recipe is our father's favorite cake of all time oh yeah you cannot go wrong with dad's apple cake never it is a birthday cake a coffee cake an anniversary cake I'm hungry and I want some cake oh my gosh my daughters are visiting I need some cake cake yes yeah all of those things but so to divert back to the Mary's Memo and what kind of started all of this is this kind of not even a diet is at all what she presents I think it's like a healthy eating tips kind of a way to get you started being more in the moment you know to think about being present as you eat foods because you know I probably starting in the 70s with tv dinners and watching tv as you ate and my goodness we certainly do it today we watch tv while we eat or we sit on the couch and eat yes we are not in the moment enjoying that food and recognizing the food that's in our mouth not at all and so Mary not a fad diet no not um she picked one and I'm going to tell you it is called the Better Than a Diet Program and the long and the short of this Better Than a Diet Program is to take an apple every day and be one with the apple smell the apple cut the apple peel the apple now smell the apple again then taste the apple but only a tiny bite what do you taste what are the aromas of the apple it is you know basically spend 15 minutes with this apple eating recognizing in general the idea is just as you said pay attention to what you're eating I remember back when we were kids our Aunt Sandie did that diet where well it wasn't really a diet she said chew every piece of food a hundred times every time every time yep you know she was serious dinner was cold by the time we finished eating dinner after trying that but it was another way to kind of think about what you were eating yes you know as we're talking about diet plans or you know eating plans I actually found this article online that was written by a woman very recently and it was called I Ate Like a 1970s Housewife and Here's What Happened I saw that and I didn't open it oh I'm so glad you didn't because it is the craziest fad diet I've ever heard of it is basically eggs wine and steak oh my gosh it is called The Wine and Eggs Diet did you look it up too not through that but it was absolutely a fad diet of the 70s oh my gosh this woman said she was so drunk and so sick at the end of every day she goes you know I drink wine I eat eggs and steak but just nothing but wine and eggs and steak she had to give it up how could you not so what I read is that you started with an egg and a glass of wine and then you had whatever they dictated for lunch and a glass of wine and then you ate again whatever they told you to and the rest of the bottle the rest of the bottle one bottle allowed per day it said yes an entire bottle of wine each day and no carbs to kind of soak it up that's right so it's breakfast is one egg hard-boiled one glass of white wine dry preferably Chablis oh and black coffee lunch it gets even better two eggs hard-boiled is best but poached if necessary that makes a difference I don't know now wait a minute two glasses of white wine at lunch imagine if you were at work no you couldn't do this no this would be a housewife although in the 70s I don't believe it was incredibly uncommon to have the booze drawer at work true our dad had a candy drawer well he was a school principal so no booze drawer no but I like the candy drawer a lot better than a booze drawer yes you were six that's true that's true all right and then dinner is a five ounce steak now specifically grilled with black pepper and lemon juice oh delicious remainder of the white wine and more black coffee wow so kudos to Mary for doing a well-balanced non-fad diet because I will tell you there was no shortage of fad diet options in the 70s no not at all I think our mom did every one of them I have no doubt yeah yeah I remember her and I could not find anything about this mentioning to me recently that she did one that you took your most favorite food in the world and you opened it and you smelled it and you licked it and then you put it away oh but like within sight torture yes I do have another fad diet I have two oh I can't wait to hear about it I feel like I need to tell you I think you do and I feel like I need to tell you before we start measuring sugar well because they're a diet that's right so let's get the diet part over with so then we can make the world's best apple cake right which you should have one of a day forget these diets you really should and folks this is one recipe you are going to want to go to our website and find every time we make this oh it's a hit it is a huge hit and people ask me for this recipe constantly my husband who hates all cake yeah loves this it is the moistest cake ever you said moist you can't go wrong with it and I scoured the interwebs looking for this cake recipe you can't find it it is nowhere I found close variations of it but nowhere did I find this recipe or something like it no we have no idea where it came from you cannot find it in the 1970s Sexy Pineapple Diet sexy they are not calling pineapples sexy oh oh you will be sexy if you eat pineapple yes okay and the idea is is that there's something in it that will make you oh gosh I don't know the word sexed up oh wow um they're aphrodisiacs you're kidding me according to these people you eat normally and then two days a week you just eat pineapple oh my that is not healthy oh not even close your blood sugar would be through the roof on those days yes you know that's crazy and do you remember those diet pills that mom used to have they were called unfortunately they were called Ayds a-y-d-s no yep they were really popular in the 1970s and 1980s until actual disease AIDS came out and then they totally took them off the market of course yeah but they were these little candies like chocolate candies or you can get them in caramel I remember mom telling me do not touch these they look like chocolate they smell like chocolate but they are a medicine yeah wow and what was crazy is that the advertisements for these say no drugs all natural just vitamins and healthy good for you supplements and they're chock full of uppers I mean yes really you know the when they first came out and I think the 1950s they were made with benzocaine which is in Orajel it totally numbed your mouth you couldn't feel the food you couldn't taste the food how horrible would that be well then why would you want to eat you wouldn't want to eat that would be horrific oh that's mean that was really bad and so then they switch-a-rooed I think in like late 60s early 70s and they put in a med that's not only a stimulant um that was found in over-the-counter cough and cold medicines it was also found in veterinary medicine as an incontinence med for dogs what so that sounds healthy to be taken that for sure so bad so basically they were uppers you don't remember these at all right that mom's taking them not at all she had them in the little medicine cabinet off of the guest bathroom yes that was off of our laundry room do you remember that I do medicine cabinet well I started thinking about that bathroom which made me think of the countertop that was in that bathroom do you remember it oh so very well it had it was like sepia tones yeah and it had what looked like old clippings of old newspapers yes old advertisements from like the 1800s yes and they had similar countertop on Wendy's tables and on the wallpaper in Subway restaurants back in the 80s oh how funny yes I found a picture of it and it brought back memories because you would sit on the toilet and read the ads and read the ads of course

so I'll put that on the website you can all see what it was but I mean I could instantly pick out which one it was there were a variety of choices on the interwebs yes and I found it well because you recognize the ads you'd read oh so many times oh so many times that's so funny but now back to the to the Ayds yes diet supplement very healthy yeah yeah oh so good for you so I was doing a little garage saleing back when we were in Ohio and I got a hold of some 1970s Good Housekeeping magazines oh that's a gold mine they were a gold mine and they had an actual Ayds advertisement they had two of them but my favorite one was called the fat dress what yes and here was the advertisement it had a woman who I didn't think was fat you know she just looked normal yeah in this flowy kind of blue caftan and here's what the top said yards and yards of loose flowing material can cover up yards and yards of loose flowing body what oh yes but it gets worse but like all cover-ups it's only that eventually you have to come to grips with the real thing underneath it all you're fat shut your face yes

that's horrible it is now it goes on to kind of be sympathetic to the fat woman in it we just want to help you get fat fat fatty right let us help you yes that unsightly fat from your body now that we've insulted you take these chocolate non-drug drugs and your life will be better wow yeah that's the serious fat shaming going on there big time there was tons of fat shaming in the 1970s no wonder our mom dieted all the time and she was not fat no right it was kind of what you needed to do right you know they just made it as if you want to I'm going to air quote take care of yourself you need to do these things right I mean even Mary says at the end of her apple a day comment is that she is going to do this to kind of fit better into her spring fashions to make them look better on her right yeah right so I thought it was a mentality of the time right not that the spring fashions were cut in an unflattering way no you need to alter your body to fit wow interesting it is okay so that was kind of a downer it was I'm sorry but I I've got the fix you have an upper much like Ayds I do really if I had to pick a fad diet in the 70s this is the one I would want to follow oh I can't wait to hear it yeah it's called the Sleeping Beauty Diet it's premise is very simple hungry go take a nap I had a boss one time when I was struggling to to stay on the diet she goes I don't worry about diets if I get home and I want to eat eat eat I just go to bed yeah well she apparently followed the Sleeping Beauty Diet you know what I guess that wouldn't be so bad family fend for yourself I'm going to bed I don't know can you sleep 24/7 I probably could now it it was unhealthy and the fact that if you actually couldn't fall asleep it recommended you take something to make you fall asleep oh my goodness you know drugging yourself was a far better option than eating apparently absolutely oh that's beautiful Sleeping Beauty Diet so the next time I go take a nap I'm gonna be oh no no I'm not napping I'm dieting that's awesome I don't think is actually any better but probably not okay so enough of all that craziness let's move on to the world's best apple cake yep if you try this at home and you disagree you're wrong there's no way you can this is I'm not kidding this is awesome so let's read out what's in this one let's see the cool thing about this is you peel the apples and you put them in a bowl with the sugar and oil yes and you let it sit until the sugar is almost completely dissolved into that oil you kind of stir it up and it does something to the cake that the sugar's sitting in that oil for that long and that much oil has got to make moist cake oh it's an insane amount of oil it is plus it kind of marinates the apples so they don't get brown that's right none of that happens no and so it has your typical apple cake ingredients vanilla cinnamon nutmeg and you know we'll put in some salt some baking powder eggs and then four cups of apples thinly sliced so we got out my old-fashioned apple slicer peeler gizmo that you kind of hook on the countertop and we will see if it actually stays hooked to the countertop you may hear a very loud noise and somebody go oh my gosh it's because it flew off well it'll be me I'm the designated apple core peeler user um so Kristen and I are going to have a race as to who can prepare the most app I've already started nah nah nah nah nah nah she's cheating now I'm not surprised by this no no we are not now mom taught me how to to peel apples you just kind of move the knife towards your thumb which I was always scared of as a kid but you know talk about super easy I'm almost done with this apple oh my gosh I can't figure out how to get mine started because the little machine keeps wiggling wobbling off yeah that was my concern it doesn't fit on the countertop very tightly now what it says is to cut your apple and core your apple and then just kind of make thin slices but I don't ever do slices that are the full length of the apple I like to cut each apple slice in half so they're little like inch long thin pieces of apple we don't have like full on big slices is that how you do it too yes absolutely yep so I'm getting the core out of this one as Carrie's still struggling oh my gosh this machine stinks oh my goodness so as we're doing this you know this is Dad's favorite cake of all time and when I told him that we would be making this his comment was oh do I have a fact for you and you really need to share this on your podcast really yes and so he was very very amused by this the fact that apple seeds contain cyanide oh yes and you would have to eat 150 to a few thousand apple seeds crushed up to die or to kill someone so please don't do this to someone because Kristen and Carrie told you to we are not recommending it no if you do it because you heard it on this podcast please just blame our dad oh he's a nice guy he is he just thought this was the funniest coolest fact all right oh we have two apples done all right not too shabby we need I think we have a total of six apples but I think it may be too much yes I looked online to see how many apples it took to make a cup I don't remember what the answer was I think maybe like a medium apple makes one cup of apple slices so we should theoretically need four okay smelling apples reminds me of when we went trick-or-treating the doctor who lived in our neighborhood gave apples red delicious and I used to beg our father to not make me have to go to his house oh my gosh and he would be like no you're gonna go and you're gonna take his stupid apple the doctor who did this didn't mean to be sneaky or ugly about it no but there was a man in our neighborhood he was a dentist that's true that's true so it made sense yes but there was a man in our neighborhood who loved to trick kids especially the greedy ones do you remember he would have a jar that had a narrow mouth full of coins yes and he would go take all that you want and so greedy kids would reach their hand and get their fist full of coins and then couldn't get their hand out of the jar do you remember that I totally remember so how did you take coins out so I took one yeah me too yeah yeah had I taken more my dad who was waiting at the end of the driveway would have made me take them back I know

all right so we have the apples in the bowl and now we're going to measure out the oil and get that in there and mix it in with the sugar and we're going to let that sit for a bit so let's see it is how much oil one cup one cup okay I can handle that I got out the liquid measuring cup for that pour that and I will add the sugar in okay and so while we are doing these things I also called our father to let him know we were making his apple cake aww and I called him because I got thinking about the whole saying in apple a day and obviously it's not true right yeah so it made me think about other things that parents say to their children that are not true you know there's a million of them right you sit too close to the television you'll go blind you cross your eyes they'll stay that way I don't know there's a million anyway so I got thinking of the falsehoods that our father liked to tell us and one of his favorites was if you pee in the middle of the road you'll get a stye in your eye I told someone that just a couple weeks ago I got a stye and I I must have been peeing in the middle of the road that's what I said and they were like what what what are you talking about I'm like well that's what my dad said they're like okay

as a little girl I really contemplated how that would happen and I decided you must sit on like the little grate that the water goes down and pee there because I mean what a messy affair to pee in the middle of the road oh gosh that's horrible I really put thought into it you did I didn't think about it that much another of our father's favorites is if you see a round barn you know a man died in there yes he did and how did he die you ask he died because he couldn't find a corner to pee in what oh my gosh our dad is full of urine jokes that's true wow so I had those two I remembered them and so I had to call him because there was one more and I I couldn't remember I remembered the result I couldn't remember the action and so I called him I'm like dad what is it that you have to do to put hair on your chest and he like he's like oh anything you want you eat hot sauce that'll put hair on your chest you uh eat horseradish that'll put hair on your chest so anything strong and flavored or drink black coffee that'll put hair on your chest so I actually found a website of the top 10 things that will put hair on your chest you are kidding me I'm going to avoid those at all costs well at least it's not put hair on your chin and I've got to get to the age where I do not want to have any more hair on my chin that I might have to pluck right right my tweezers are dulled from the action so I looked it up and there were other things and then I had a conversation with your husband oh and he could like zip em off what yes he knew a whole bunch well I guess this must be something that men think about constantly how could I get more hair on my chest let me eat horseradish eating the crust of bread puts hair on your chest what are some more um drinking whiskey okay obviously that was not said to children right um gosh I can't remember those were the top ones that struck me but we'll put a link to that website for sure on our website because I mean you have to know there's 10 things you could do to quickly get some hair to your chest my son might like that and again I am going to avoid those foods at all costs my husband was sitting in the room as I had the conversation with my dad and my husband loves hot sauce oh yeah and so he heard me repeat hot sauce puts hair on your chest and he goes ha ha sure doesn't poor guy oh yeah well that's funny well I'm so glad you had a nice conversation with our dad I had the how to poison someone with cyanide conversation so well yours was nice but also a lot about urine and hair on your hair on your chest well you know we're letting this sit for about five minutes five to ten minutes I like to let it sit for just as long as the sugar you don't see the sugar granules anymore it's kind of combined with the oil I took a picture for you all of what it looked like when we just stirred in the sugar and the oil you could see the the grains and now it's only been a few minutes and it's already starting to look more liquefied but we'll give it just a few more it's science in action ohh la la so while that sits you move on to the second part of the recipe which is adding all the cake stuff and making that that's right we could just mix all the dry ingredients um in something else and then dump it in yeah okay so we'll mix them up in here okay so we need eggs flour and flavorful things okay so here's the bowl why don't you mix up the eggs in that because they're eggs mixed well there's one eggy poo excellent and here we go again second eggy poo all right and so I don't think that we really should do this in a separate bowl you just mix the eggs and then we'll go ahead and put it all in the single bowl I never mix the stuff separately I just dump it all into the cake and stir stir see guys this is why the cake is so great I don't make it like Carrie Carrie doesn't make it like me and every single time it turns out perfectly apparently mine turns out better

yeah no okay as we were talking about apples and making this recipe I was thinking about Johnny Appleseed oh I thought of him as you were talking about how to murder people with apples all right I don't think he went around murdering people with apples though Carrie no no but dad knows a lot of stories he's a big fan of Johnny Appleseed he is I um read about Johnny Appleseed and the apples that he planted and you know took the seeds all around the area we grew up and they were not you're eating apples no they were really tart and bitter and they were purely grown to make cider because you know in those times a lot of the drinking water would have been really bad filled with bacteria and you know in the area where we live was called the black swamp so you can imagine you know what type of water was there and so yes these apples were almost exclusively grown to make cider and apple jack and so you don't drink black swampy water you drink the cider so basically everyone I'd say good call well yeah but basically everyone you know living at that time was like they were on the 1970s wine diet right you could have non-alcoholic cider that's true but but what I read is ain't nobody was making that oh yeah um so now I'm putting in our vanilla and keep going you can never get too much vanilla oops I spilled a little too much two teaspoons of vanilla I have in the two teaspoons of cinnamon one teaspoon of nutmeg one and a half teaspoons of the baking powder and one teaspoon of the salt and here come the eggs okay we're just going to mix it all together exciting that makes the worst oogie moogie sound as you stir it

remember how I said this cake is moist well it makes a very moist sound when you stir it oh yes yes it does the cool thing about this cake so many things are cool about this cake is that so you don't have to grease and flour the pan no you don't have to grease it at all there's so much oil in the cake that yep and we're just going to throw it into a 9x13 pan yeah I mean it's the same pan that our mom used for all of our birthday cakes absolutely decorated fancily on the top or would cut them so that the 9x13 became the shape of the number one I was looking at old pictures and mom made me a hot air balloon cake a clown cake yes I think you had a Raggedy Ann cake I don't remember that one red licorice hair oh wow cool why do I remember that I don't know I had a Miss Piggy cake oh I loved Miss Piggy and she was pretty crafty with cutting those cakes up she did a great job yeah or we'd have a one of these nine by 13 sheet cakes and she would just draw she drew Kermit the Frog on one of mine and it looked exactly like it wow like him she was really good do you remember any of the ones that you had I didn't find any pictures of those I don't think she loved you

did you have decorated cakes like that I didn't have birthday parties oh that's right just I'm just kidding but you know what your birthday's on Halloween so yeah odds are pretty good that most of my parties were Halloween type cakes so they I didn't I don't think I had that variety apparently my mom likes to tell the story is she had asked me I had multiple Halloween themed birthday parties and so I was I don't know six or seven at this point and she's like well Carrie would you like something other than a costume party for your birthday and I looked at her like shocked and dismayed and I said why would I do that so apparently no all of my birthday cakes must have been holiday themed I guess they must have been yeah I don't remember any of them I don't I did could not find a single picture of any birthday cakes of yours I saw your birthday parties yeah but no not a single cake so we're going to put this cake in I have spread it into the pan uh nine by 13 inch pan did I do it right Carrie did I do it right very very beautifully well thank you thank you and we are going to put that into our already preheated oven preheated to 350 we will pop that in we're going to let that bake for about 45 minutes and we'll get back with you real soon

we have removed from the oven the most beautiful apple cake it is gorgeous it is golden brown well shall I cut it up yeah absolutely go for it now the question is how many slices do you cut it into we had this conversation when writing down the recipe for you all because Carrie and I had the original recipes mine was on a post-it note that was dirty and oil-splattered and yours was on some type of an equally gross note yeah from college it was a free notepad that college gave so we wrote it on a nice recipe card for you all and we kind of hemmed and hawed about serves how many we had to look up how many people does a 9x13 cake pan serve because in my mind with apple cake this 9x13 pan would serve three people yes I I think it depends on the appetite of your family so if you can serve 15 from this apple cake good for you and if you serve four we totally understand that totally understand that now would you like an end piece or a middle piece Carrie oh any piece you want to give me I will happily eat all right let me take my handy dandy spatula that my lovely friend Juline found for us how nice thank you Juline it is beautiful Corningware handle wow so 70s the nice cornflower blue oh it is gorgeous now awesome getting the first piece of cake out is always the trickiest we won't take a picture of that one the spatula bends perfectly to get cake out oh it's made for this it's made for it so I'm going to give you the crispy ends okay so the top of our apple cake is naked it is just apple cake we do not put sugar on it we do not make glazes to put over the top of it not at all it is just apple cake now if you wanted to zhuzh it up a little um feel free maybe some sugar sprinkled before it's you know completely cut that's my piece what are you doing this is my piece I'm taking the crumbs out from the pan before we even take our first bite it's mine it's mine

can you stop talking I want to taste this right now

I think this is about the most excited we've ever been only because we know this recipe and we know we love it so much it smells heavenly I can even smell the nutmeg the cinnamon the house smells like a bakery we have nice cups of coffee to go with our cake yes and Carrie I bought this beautiful avocado green percolator wow from Pat in Ohio when we last visited that was the trip in which we found the final Mary's Memo oh my gosh and an avocado green percolator yep and Pat said it was her mom's and so we have brewed ourselves up some delicious cups of coffee in it to have with our apple cake which makes a delicious coffee cake it does and as we mentioned anything cake okay Kristen I'm gonna let you go first because that's the kind of nice sister I am plus the drool it's getting to me I know right well you know I'm eating gluten-free because sometimes gluten makes me not feel so good but I'm taking a bite of this cake mmm she's digging in for a second bite so I suppose I ought to chat at you while she continues to it's so moist um Carrie you finish the podcast I'll be over here with my coffee and the cake we have we have lost Kristen to the apple cake it's understandable it's it's easy to get lost into is it just as tasty and it is so good and it's still warm and it's always good with a scoop of ice cream or some cool whip cool whip or real whipped cream you really just can't go wrong no why don't you take a bite I'll take a sip of my delicious coffee from our new percolator our new old percolator our new old percolator thank you for that good find I know I was just absolutely thrilled to find that I have not had this cake and so long it's been years yep mmm it may be better than I remember it you really cannot beat this and I know that you know we've said that a million times but guys you've got to try this cake and not all of our recipes that we make on this show are going to be so delicious no but this one takes the cake

well I am super happy to do an apple cake a day if we're eating this I'm with you I am right there well that is it for this episode thank you so much for joining us if you like what you heard please share this podcast with a friend and be sure to give us some positive feedback otherwise as my mom would say if you can't see anything nice don't say anything at all don't make me get my wooden spoon

thanks for listening to Mom's Wooden Spoon if you like what you heard don't forget to subscribe if you want a copy of this recipe or to check out our blog click on the link to our website in the podcast description if you'd rather you could get to our website through Facebook Twitter or Instagram pick your poison don't say poison we're making food