Friday, June 1, 2012

Ginny Bee Breakfast Cake

Well I am sure one thing that comes to mind is who is Ginny Bee?  Ginny Bee is actually the creation of  John Edwards.  Ginny is a citrus picker, mostly used for oranges.  Before Johns invention, there were other pickers on the market but they were plagued with the problem of  causing tree damage when harvesting. However, in 1976, John came up with a well functioning machine that did not damage any part of the tree or limbs.  With the tree damage not being an issue, his machine was found to be quite handy to have in the groves.  It could pick a 90 lb box of oranges in one minute, which was a real time saver.

This particular recipe is basically an orange breakfast cake.  The cake part has a citrus tang and is moist, having both sour cream and yogurt as ingredients.  Also, there is no skimping on the streusel-it is thick crunchy and has a drizzle of orange glaze.  Since we all seem to enjoy orange juice in the morning, I thought that orange in a breakfast cake would be a good way to start the day.

Ginny Bee Breakfast Cake
by flourtrader

Ingredients/Streusel
1 cup or 2 sticks melted butter
1 tbs plus 1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 cup packed dark brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 tsp salt
2 1/2 cups flour

Ingredients/Cake
2/3 cup orange yogurt
2/3 cup sour cream
4 tbs orange zest
1 tsp orange extract
2 eggs
3/4 cup or 1 1/2 sticks of butter, room temp
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 1/2 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda

Ingredients/Drizzle
1 cup powdered sugar
1 tbs orange juice

To make streusel, stir together the cinnamon, both sugars and salt.  Then pour in the melted butter and mix until all is blended.  Then blend in the flour until no dry streaks remain and the mixture clumps together.  Set aside.

For the cake, preheat the oven to 350 degress.  Butter the inside of a 9X13 baking dish.  Then line the bottom and along 2 sides with overhang.  Butter the face up side of the parchment.

Beat the butter in a large bowl until creamy.  Add the sugar, beating again until mixture is completely blended.  Add one egg and blend, running mixer for about 30 seconds.  Repeat the process with the other egg.

Put the sour cream, yogurt, orange zest and orange extract into the batter and blend until all is smooth.  Set aside.

In a different bowl, sift together the flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda. Then, in increments of 1/3, fold the ingredients into the wet batter.  Mix until no dry streaks remain.

Spoon batter into prepared pan and smooth with spatula so bottom of pan is evenly covered.  Take some streusel into your hand and clump together, then sprinkle on batter.  Continue with the clumping and sprinkling until all the batter is covered.

Place in oven and bake for about 1 hour or when tester comes out clean.  Streusel should be a deep brown and be crisp.  Let cool in pan on rack for 30 minutes.

While cooling, you can prepared the drizzle.  Beat the ingredients together until the texture becomes a smooth glaze.  You can add more of either ingredient until you reach the desired consistency.

After the cake has cooled for 30 minutes, drizzle glaze on top.  Cake is tasty served warm as well as cold.  Use parchment handles to lift out of pan and cut into squares.

Tips and Notes:
1. I like streusel and the recipe here probably yields over 4 cups, so if you are not that big on this topping, you can cut down the recipe.
2. You can add nuts to the streusel if you want.
3. The topping is very crumbly, so it will be hard to get a clean cut..
4. Bake time is for a glass pan, other pans may have some variance in the baking time.
                     **LAST YEAR: Jamaican Coin Cookies**