Old Fashioned Spice Cake

I made a couple of these cakes to give away last week.  I've never liked cake but when I was a little girl, I liked spice cake.  It's another good Fall recipe.

Ingredients for one cake:

• 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp ground nutmeg
• 1 tsp ground ginger
• 1/2 tsp allspice
• 1/4 tsp ground cloves
• 1 3/4 cups packed light-brown sugar
• 3/4 cup  vegetable oil
• 3/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
• 4 large eggs
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 cup  buttermilk
• 1 cup chopped pecans
Cream Cheese Frosting
• 12 oz cream cheese,  room temperature
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter,  room temperature
• 3 1/2 cups powdered sugar
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

 Grind some pecans or walnuts and set them aside.

 Beat all of the wet ingredients together with the brown sugar and butter and gradually beat in the dry ones.

  Pour the batter into greased and parchment lined pans and bake at 350 degrees for about 40 minutes until a toothpick stuck in the middle comes out clean.  Cool on racks.

 I frosted these with the basic cream cheese frosting above.  I always place waxed paper under the bottom layer and when I am done frosting and decorating, I just slide the paper out and you have a clean cake plate.

 Press the ground nuts onto the side of the cake and sprinkle the edges with Fall colored sprinkles.

This is a very dense, moist cake.