Faux Cream Cheese Frosting and Salted Caramel by Rachel

If you've embarked on making the Spiced Apple Cake and want to fancy it up, you can definitely frost it with your standard buttercream frosting.  I frosted mine with a slightly healthier faux cream cheese frosting and homemade salted caramel.

From this boring cake...

To this yummy creation!

The faux cream cheese frosting is a little lighter and fluffier than your average frosting because I didn't want to weigh down the spiced apple cake since it's a denser type of cake.  It's "faux" because it doesn't actually use any cream cheese.  It uses Greek yogurt and tastes so good with this cake.



Ingredients for the Faux Cream Cheese Frosting:

1/2 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup superfine sugar
2 tbsp 2% Greek yogurt (I used Fage)

- Very simple- add all ingredients to a bowl and mix with a hand mixer until the mixture is thick and forms peaks.

- Taste it!  This is important to making a frosting that you like.  If you want it sweeter, add a little more sugar.  If you want it tangier, add a little more yogurt.  Be careful not to add too much yogurt though because it will weigh down the frosting.

- Frost your cake.  I did it in a rustic fashion so that you could see some of the frosting spill over the sides, but I didn't actually frost the side.

Ingredients for the Salted Caramel Sauce:

1 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
2/3 heavy cream
3 1/2 tbsp unsalted butter, cubed
1/2 tsp sea salt

- Add the sugar and water to a medium sauce pan.  Gently stir on medium-low setting on the stove until the sugar is dissolved into the water.

- Stop stirring and turn the heat to medium.  The sugar/water mixture should start to boil shortly after that.  Don't stir it.  You'll need to watch the mixture closely.  After about 6-7 minutes, the mixture should start to turn brown.  It should start to smell slightly burnt.

- As soon as the mixture starts to get deep in color, kind of like a maple syrup color, remove it from the stove and whisk in the heavy cream SLOWLY.  The mixture will bubble up big.  Continue to whisk- the bubbles will calm down.

- Add the butter and salt and continue to whisk.  Don't worry if the mixture still looks a little runny.  Once it cools, it will solidify a little more.

See?  Ooey gooey goodness.

- Once the caramel is cooled, add it to whatever you want!  Here's my cake:

Drippy, sticky, and full of fall flavor.  I made this cake for a dinner party and it's a real stunner.  Get cooking and enjoy!