Friday, October 1, 2021

A Plague, an Apple, and Science


Caramel Apple Bundt Cake features favorite warm fall flavors using cinnamon chips and caramel apple pops. | recipe developed by www.BakingInATornado.com | #recipe #dessert
 
The plague, an apple, and science.
 
If we were playing Jeopardy right now, you could ring your buzzer and, forming your response in a question, say "What inspired Isaac Newton?" 
 
Why am I bringing up Isaac Newton? Blame the plague. No, not his bubonic plague, our Coronavirus.
 
It's October, a month that always brought me joy in the past. I loved playing with my food, from my Jack-O-Lantern Treat Bowls and Mocha Mummies snacks, to Snake Sandwich lunches and Bloody Fingers dinners to Individual Mummy Pies and Billy the Puppet Cake deserts. Part of it was the fun inspiration October brings, but the biggest joy was seeing the looks on the faces of my kids and their friends. Then, when you thought it couldn't possibly get any better, the month culminated in the parade of children in costumes right at my front door.
 
That changed in the past few years. First my boys had the unmitigated gall to go and grown up. Without the reaction, playing with my food became less fun. Then last year Covid forced a change in Halloween itself. This year I'm pretty sure I won't be passing out candy to unmasked kids of unvaccinated parents.
 
Enter Isaac Newton. Or really, I should say, enter the apple. Bringing along some interesting parallels and a new direction for my October recipes.
 
Caramel Apple Bundt Cake features favorite warm fall flavors using cinnamon chips and caramel apple pops. | recipe developed by www.BakingInATornado.com | #recipe #dessert
Caramel Apple Bundt Cake
 
Don't be surprised if I revert to a fun Halloween themed recipe or two. And although I promise not to focus only on pumpkin, there may be a couple of those making an October appearance as well. But for this year, Fall has me thinking more along the lines of apple. Inspired by Sir Isaac.
 
Newton was born in England in the 1600s. His father had a sheep farm and was successful, but he died before Isaac was even born. His mother remarried and moved away when he was 3, leaving him to be raised by his grandmother, until his mother's second husband died and she returned, with Isaac's half siblings. 
 
It was to that sheep farm that Isaac returned when Cambridge University closed down due to the plague. The result was a little home schooling of the bonked-on-the-head-by-an-apple variety. His visit to the homestead not only inspired his thoughts about gravity and motion, in which the seeds of the entire study of physics grew, but calculus as well (for which I decidedly would not have thanked him during my own college years, btw).

A Plague, an Apple, and Science | graphic designed by, featured on, and property of www.BakingInATornado.com | #MyGraphics #Fall

Besides being raised in an unconventional family situation, having his education interrupted by a plague, benefiting from a belief in reality and science, there's another interesting correlation between Newton's life and what's going on in our country now. Seems he knew a thing or two about building walls. But unlike the self-proclaimed builder of walls here, and in the spirit of Newton's third law that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction, he's been credited with the quote "we build too many walls and not enough bridges."  
 
The apple tree on Woolsthorpe Manor is still there, by the way, over 400 years old and, I'd imagine, still able to provide respite from the plague, and a reminder to respect science. Perhaps it should have some visitors from our side of the pond, I can think of a few American politicians (a whole party of them, in fact) who might benefit from a good old fashioned scientific bonk on the head.


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Caramel Apple Bundt Cake         

                                                       ©www.BakingInATornado.com

Printable Recipe

Ingredients:
1 cup apple juice
1 packet (.74 oz) instant caramel apple cider
10 caramel apple flavored lollipops
1 box yellow cake mix
1/2 cup oil
4 eggs
1/4 cup cinnamon baking chips

1/2 cup powdered sugar

Directions:
*Heat the apple juice in the microwave for 2 minutes. Whisk the caramel apple cider mix into the juice until dissolved. Refrigerate for 15 minutes.
*Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour a nonstick bundt pan.
*Crush the caramel apple pops and discard the sticks.
*Once the cider mix has cooled, set aside 2 TBSP for the glaze, then beat the rest, along with the cake mix, oil, and eggs for 2 minutes. Mix in the cinnamon baking chips and about 2/3 of the crushed caramel apple candy.
*Spread the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 35 to 40 minutes or until the center springs back to the touch. Cool in the pan for 10 minutes, run a knife around the edges and remove to cool completely.
*Mix the remaining cider mix with the powdered sugar. Drizzle over the cooled cake and immediately top with the remaining chopped candy, pressing in gently to hold.

14 comments:

  1. Yep. I know a few people who could use a good old 'scientific' bonk on the head. Can I have the first throw?

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  2. Newton's biography is fascinating indeed. You'd think the pandemic itself would have given people the bonk on the head. Instead, we are heading in some scary directions, and that's no Halloween event. Alana ramblinwitham.blogspot.com

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    Replies
    1. You would think, but then I've come to realize that not all of us think.

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  3. I'll throw the first apple gladly!!! Happy October sis!

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  4. Most of my husbands family would bennifit from a wac k on the head

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    Replies
    1. Lol, I think all of my husband's family are suffering from a few too many whacks on the head.

      Delete
  5. I am so down to throw apples at people...
    Let's do this...I'll buy the apples!

    ReplyDelete
  6. That cake looks decidedly decadent.

    How about putting the treats in individual bags and passing them out by one of those grabber things? We always set up a chair and table near the sidewalk, and one of us sits where the kids don't have to come that close, and we use the grabber to put a bag in their bag. Last year, one little guy had a fish net on a stick for us to put the treats in, his parents were smart.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You're lucky to live in a place where the weather would allow you to do that.

      Delete
  7. Ohh, I love Halloween treats and snacks. I've already thought about how I could dress up my home and go to a few hay rides. Love the cake. so cute.

    ReplyDelete

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