Happy Mother's Day and Apple Cake - No. 1

Happy Mother's Day to all!

Saturday, Luke came happily into my room in the morning. "Tomorrow is the big day!" He was so excited for mother's day, and it warmed my heart.

And we had a great time. First, church. Nice to see all the kids going to church with their mothers. Then, Fr. Hubby took us out to lunch at Island's. I had the delish teriyaki burger, plus onion rings and french fries, and we all shared the brownie vanilla ice cream and the coffee ice cream desserts.

Afterwards, we came home and ate pot roast for dinner. Or, roast pot, as one of my dear children said. DH put the babies to bed, very nice.

I got lovely gifts: a homemade bracelet from Luke, fresh flowers from SteVB and Jess, a hand colored potholder from Nadia, and a beautiful breakfast made by Luke: not one but TWO sandwiches - peanut butter & jelly, and a butter sandwich. And hot chocolate.

Then, in the evening Naomi asked if I would like anything and I wanted some cake. So at my request she baked one of the cakes from my childhood, from the Gardena Buddhist Church cookbook (the home of all 1970s Japanese-American potluck recipes).

It turns out that Naomi made Apple Cake - No. 1. Delish.

But there are also the following recipes in this cookbook:
Apple Cake - No. 2
Delicious Apple Cake
Fresh Apple Cake - No. 1
Fresh Apple Cake - No. 2
Fresh Apple Cake - No. 3
Happy Apple Cake
Yo's Apple Cake
Apple Chunkies
Applesauce Fruit Cake
Quik Chocolate Applesauce Cake

So. We liked Apple Cake - No. 1. But we may need to go on a bit of an apple cake quest in order to figure out the best of the apple cakes. I think Naomi's interested in the Happy Apple Cake. But I think they call it Happy Apple Cake just because of the brandy in there.

We amended Apple Cake - No. 1 in order to have less sugar. Here it is with less sugar:

4 eggs
1.5 cups sugar
4 tsp. vanilla
1 cup oil
2 cups flour
2 tsp cinnamon
4 tsp baking powder
2 cups fresh apple slices
1 cup nuts, chopped (we omitted this, didn't have 'em)

Mix together eggs, sugar, vanilla and oil. Add flour, cinnamon, baking powder, apple slices and nuts. Pour into wax paper lined (bottom only) 9x13 inch pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour or until cake tests done.