Apple Caramel Tray Bake with the Thermomix® has one feature you do not spot at first glance: the caramel cream goes on at the end, but it works like a second layer. It seeps into the apple topping, binds with the sugar coating on the slices and turns a simple yeast cake into something that is infused from top to bottom. The Thermomix® runs for 3 minutes on kneading mode, the dough rests for an hour, then 20 minutes in the oven.
What makes the assembly special: We coat the apple slices in sugar before baking and arrange them in overlapping layers on the raw dough. The sugar caramelises lightly on the underside of the slices during baking. When the hot caramel cream is poured over afterwards, it meets this already sweet layer and penetrates deeper than it would with plain apple. The result is not a cake with a caramel glaze, but one where apple and caramel are conceived together from the start.
Apple Caramel Tray Bake with the Thermomix®
Ingredients 0 / 14 ✓
- 50 g hard caramel sweets
- 500 g flour
- 20 g yeast
- 70 g butter softened
- 200 g milk
- 1 egg
- 80 g sugar
- 1 pinch salt
- 5 apples
- 100 g sugar for coating
- 100 g sugar
- 1 pinch salt
- 40 g butter
- 50 g double cream
Instructions 0 / 7
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1
Crush the caramel sweets.
Add the caramel sweets to the mixing bowl and chop for 10 seconds / speed 10, then set aside.
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2
Knead the dough.
Add all the dough ingredients to the mixing bowl and knead for 3 minutes / kneading mode. Transfer the dough to a bowl, cover and leave to rise in a warm place for 1 hour. Line a baking tray with baking paper.
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3
Preheat the oven.
Preheat the oven to 180°C.
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4
Roll out the dough.
Meanwhile, roll out the yeast dough and place it on the prepared baking tray.
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5
Prepare the apples.
Peel the apples, quarter them and remove the cores. Slice the apples, coat in sugar and arrange in overlapping layers on the dough. Bake on the middle shelf for 20 minutes. Leave the cake to cool.
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6
Caramelise.
While the cake cools, make a caramel cream in a frying pan using the sugar, salt, butter and double cream: add the sugar and salt to the pan and melt over medium heat, stirring constantly. As soon as the sugar turns brown, stir in the butter, then add the double cream.
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7
Pour the caramel over the cake.
Spread the caramel cream over the cake and sprinkle the crushed caramel sweets on top.
Video
Nutrition per serving
Why the caramel cream stays in the pan
We make the caramel cream outside the Thermomix®: melt the sugar and a pinch of salt over medium heat, stirring constantly, then stir in the butter and add the double cream. It comes together quickly, but there is no mistake you can correct. Take it off the heat too early and the sugar has not melted fully. Leave it too long and it turns bitter.
Our recommendation: take more time over medium heat rather than risk it over high heat. Caramel burns in seconds. The sugar must be completely liquid before the butter goes in, otherwise it will clump. You can tell it is ready when the sugar is an even golden brown with no white crystals visible.
The sweets are not just decoration
The hard caramel sweets go into the mixing bowl first: 10 seconds on speed 10, then set aside. The result is a coarse caramel powder that goes onto the hot cake after the cream is poured. The residual heat melts some of the granules while others stay crunchy. This texture is the counterpart to the soft caramel layer beneath. Leave out the sweets and you get a different cake.
Goes well with: Vanilla ice cream and coffee.
Which apple variety works best
For this cake you need apples that hold their shape during baking and bring some acidity. We prefer Boskoop: firm, robustly tart, and it stands up to the oven well. Elstar works too, but has a milder flavour and softens a little more during baking. Cox Orange sits in the middle. What to avoid: Gala or similar soft, sweet varieties that turn mushy in the oven and amplify the caramel sweetness rather than balancing it.
When coating in sugar, make sure every slice is fully covered, not just dusted. The sugar needs to stick to the surface so it can caramelise properly during baking.
Model note: TM31 to TM7
The Thermomix® handles two steps in this recipe: crushing the sweets and kneading the yeast dough. Both work identically on the TM31, TM5, TM6 and TM7. The caramel cream and the baking take place outside the machine, and the 180°C oven stage does not involve the mixing bowl.
If you have not made yeast dough in the Thermomix® many times before, it is worth reading our article on kneading with the Thermomix®. We explain what kneading mode does differently from normal speeds and how to tell when the dough is fully kneaded.
If you prefer a shortcrust base under the apples instead of yeast dough, you will find the apple tart with the Thermomix® on mixmyday.com. For a quick tray bake with no proving time, the crumble cake without yeast is a good alternative.
