I made Ina Garten's easy apple spice cake. It's the perfect dessert for fall.

From her delightfully bright breakfast cake to her "outrageous" brownies, Ina Garten's repertoire is full of delicious desserts.

Garten demonstrated the cake on an early episode of "Barefoot Contessa," revealing she used to make it at the Hamptons food store that helped launch her cooking career.

"We used to have all kinds of cakes like this out on the bakery counter, and you could come buy a whole cake, but you could also buy a piece," she said. "It's not fancy, just really delicious and earthy, and you always want to come back for more."

Before the baking began, I needed to preheat the oven and prep my pan.

I preheated the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and greased and floured my 9-inch by 13-inch baking dish.

Garten has a few tricks for getting the best flavor from her ingredients, including the pecans.

Garten explained in the "Barefoot Contessa" episode that toasting the pecans "crisps them up and brings out the flavor."

I placed my chopped pecans on a sheet pan and toasted them in the oven. Garten recommends five to 10 minutes to get them lightly toasted, so I took my pecans out after eight minutes.

I combined the rum and raisins in a small bowl, then covered it with plastic wrap and popped it in the microwave for 60 seconds.

I threw the granulated sugar, dark-brown sugar, eggs, vegetable oil, vanilla, and orange zest into the bowl of my electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment.

I sifted the flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, and cloves into a medium bowl.

I added my dry ingredients while the mixer was on low until everything was just combined.