Coffee Cake

A few months ago, my kindergartener came home exclaiming, "Mom!  My teacher made the most awesome snack for us today.  It was sooo good, you wouldn't believe it!"  OK, I'll bite.  "What was it?"

"It was called coffee cake.  But it didn't even have coffee in it.  People just eat it with coffee sometimes."

"Your teacher made you coffee cake?"  I had to admit, I was impressed.  And jealous.  I'd never made a good coffee cake, despite best efforts.  Something always went wrong.  And here, someone whose baking skills I was unable to critically evaluate (although I really like her), had introduced my daughter to this classic breakfast confection before I had.  It just didn't sit well.

"We can make coffee cake at home, you know."  It was my poker face.  I didn't actually know if we could, since I never had.  I started to realize how hard this might be.  "We can?!  Let's do it, let's do it!"

So we went home, and that weekend I made one sorry excuse for a coffee cake.  We all ate an obligatory piece, and tossed the rest.  It was dry on the edges, and kinda brown throughout, rather than high golden cake with a dark cinnamon ripple and crumbly sugar topping.  So I gave up for awhile.

Until I saw a picture in a cookbook of the perfect coffee cake, exactly how I would want mine to look.  I read the author's notes, and she said it was her rendition of her favorite cake from King Arthur Flour.  KAF!  Why hadn't I thought of that?!  Of course they will have a good one; their test kitchen actually tests recipes!  So I skipped this dubious variation and went straight to the source.

And this is what I got.

Tender, moist, vanilla yellow cake (I used my precious vanilla bean paste because I wanted it to be just really perfect.)  Cinnamon ripple, with a touch of cocoa (you barely taste it.)  Crunchy, crumbly cinnamon sugar topping (which has nothing wrong, but I may experiment with in future - nuts, oats, other spices, etc.  Now that the foundation is sure, embellishment comes next.)

Coffee cake perfection.  And yes, my little Ginger likes it, too.

Coffee Cake (print recipe)
Makes one 9x13 or two 9" round pans

Topping:
1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 T ground cinnamon
6 T unsalted butter, melted

Filling:
1 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 T ground cinnamon
1 tsp unsweetened cocoa powder

Cake:
3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 1/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1/3 cup brown sugar
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp vanilla extract or vanilla bean paste
3 large eggs
3/4 cup sour cream or plain yogurt (I used plain Greek)
1 1/4 cups milk (any; I used 2%)
3 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

1.  Preheat oven to 350°F. Lightly grease a 9" x 13" pan, or two 9" round cake pans.

2.  Make the topping by whisking together the sugar, salt, flour, and cinnamon. Add the melted butter, stirring till well combined. Set the topping aside.

3.  Make the filling by mixing together the brown sugar, cinnamon, and cocoa powder. Note that the cocoa powder is used strictly for color, not flavor; leave it out if you like. Set it aside.

4.  To make the cake: In a large bowl, beat together the butter, salt, sugars, baking powder, and vanilla until well combined and smooth.  Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.  In a separate bowl, whisk together the sour cream or yogurt and milk till well combined. You don't need to whisk out all the lumps.  Add the flour to the butter mixture alternately with the milk/sour cream mixture, beating gently to combine.

5.  Pour/spread half the batter (a scant 3 cups or 28 ounces) into the prepared pan(s), spreading all the way to the edges. If you're using two 9" round pans, spread 1 1/3 cups (14 ounces) batter in each pan.  Sprinkle the filling evenly atop the batter.  Spread the remaining batter atop the filling (this is most easily done with a rubber spatula dipped in water.) Use a table knife to gently swirl the filling into the batter, as though you were making a marble cake. Don't combine filling and batter thoroughly; just swirl the filling through the batter. Sprinkle the topping over the batter in the pan.

6.  Bake the cake until it's a dark golden brown around the edges; medium-golden with no light patches showing on top, and a toothpick or cake tester inserted into the center comes out clean, about 55 to 60 minutes for the 9" x 13" pan, 50 to 55 minutes for the 9" round pans. When pressed gently in the middle, the cake should spring back.  Remove the cake from the oven and allow it to cool for 20 minutes before cutting and serving. Serve cake right from the pan.

Recipe from King Arthur Flour

Vanilla Bean Marshmallows

Went and got me some Vanilla Bean Paste, that's what I did.  And I plan to use it every single chance I get.  I think it's fancy, and supremely delicious, and gives you vanilla bean flecks in a vanilla extract syrup, with none of the vanilla bean scraping work.  It even says on the bottle, Finest Quality. 

You can get such Fine Quality on Amazon for a pretty penny (plus shipping.)  Or Sur La Table.  Or CHEFS.  Or, if you're lucky, like me, to live near a Home Goods store, you can just browse their gourmet aisle and pick yourself up a bottle or two for just $5.99 each (plus tax.)  Love it.

My VBP's maiden recipe was this super awesome springy, bouncy, perfect marshmallow.  I made it in a jelly roll pan, then used an oiled pizza cutter to cut it into thin strips one way, then mini marshmallows the other way.  They went with my hot chocolate stir stick bar at the church Christmas party.  Good thing I like those people so much.  Not that the marshmallow was that much work; it really wasn't.  But I used a whole tablespoon of my precious VBP, and I wouldn't do that for just anyone.

Vanilla Bean Marshmallows (print recipe)
Makes 96 1-inch cubed marshmallows or about a gazillion minis

About 1 cup confectioners’ sugar plus 3 T cornstarch
3 1/2 envelopes (2 tablespoons plus 2 1/2 teaspoons) unflavored gelatin
1 cup cold water, divided
2 cups granulated sugar (cane sugar worked just fine)
1/2 cup light corn syrup
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 large egg whites or reconstituted powdered egg whites
1 tablespoon vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract (alternately: 1/2 of a scraped vanilla bean, 2 teaspoons almond or mint extract or maybe even some food coloring for tinting)

1.  Oil bottom and sides of a 13- by 9- by 2-inch rectangular metal baking pan and dust bottom and sides with some confectioners’ sugar mixed with cornstarch.  If you want to make mini marshmallows, use a jelly roll pan so the marshmallow will spread out and be shorter.

2.  In bowl of a standing electric mixer or in a large bowl sprinkle gelatin over 1/2 cup cold cold water, and let stand to soften.  It will become a gelatinous mass, and may fascinate your science-minded children.

3.  In a 3-quart heavy saucepan cook granulated sugar, corn syrup, second 1/2 cup of cold water, and salt over low heat, stirring with a wooden spoon, until sugar is dissolved. Increase heat to moderate and boil mixture, without stirring, until a candy or digital thermometer registers 240°F, about 12 minutes. Remove pan from heat and pour sugar mixture over gelatin mixture, stirring until gelatin is dissolved.

4.  With standing or a hand-held electric mixer beat mixture on high speed until white, thick, and nearly tripled in volume, about six minutes if using standing mixer or about 10 minutes if using hand-held mixer.

 
5.  In separate medium bowl with cleaned beaters beat egg whites (or reconstituted powdered whites) until they just hold stiff peaks. Beat whites and vanilla (or your choice of flavoring) into sugar mixture until just combined. Pour mixture into baking pan and don’t fret if you don’t get it all out (learning from my mess of a first round). Sift 1/4 cup confectioners sugar evenly over top. Chill marshmallow, uncovered, until firm, at least three hours, and up to one day.

6.  Run a thin knife around edges of pan and invert pan onto a large cutting board. Lifting up one corner of inverted pan, with fingers loosen marshmallow and ease onto cutting board. With a large knife trim edges of marshmallow and cut marshmallow into roughly one-inch cubes. An oiled pizza cutter works great for this, especially if you are making mini mallows.  Sift remaining confectioners’ sugar/cornstarch mixture back into your now-empty baking pan, and roll the marshmallows through it, on all six sides, before shaking off the excess and packing them away.  Or you can shake them in a plastic bag. 

Do ahead: Marshmallows keep in an airtight container at cool room temperature 1 week.

Sorry no pictures of the finished mini marshmallows - we cut them and ran to the party, no time for a photo shoot.  And of course, there were none leftover.

Recipe adapted from Gourmet, December 1998 by Smitten Kitchen

1 year ago:  Crazy Good Cinnamon Quick-ish Bread
2 years ago:  White Chocolate and Vanilla Bread Pudding
3 years ago: The Christmas Haul