Port Cherry Coffee Cake

Today, society is faced with a variety of drinks. Instead of black coffee and ice cold milk, now there is half-caf soy lattes and walnut milk. Faced with so many choices, we find ourselves trying them all. Some are good and some not so good. However, it is nice to go back to those plain "old school" drinks.

Ice cold milk or black coffee (even though considered "old school") deserves a side of pastry or cookies. The plainest of each drink calls out for a pairing of a sweet breakfast treat. After all, there is a reason some cakes are called coffee cake and these cakes contain no coffee.

This particular cake has a special blend of port wine and cherries swirling through a fluffy vanilla batter. Aside from the flavor, the moist texture derived from the sour cream and the contrasting sweet almond streusel on top is very pleasing to the palate.

So let's go into the kitchen to create a delicious side line for an "old school" beverage. One tasty slice with plain black coffee may cause you to permanently give up that Caramel Mudslide drink from the coffee house.  

Port Cherry Coffeecake
adapted from Chowhound

Ingredients/Swirl
1 cup diced dried cherries
2 cups port wine
1/4 cup sugar
1-3 inch cinnamon stick
1 vanilla bean, split and opened up flat
1/4 tsp sea salt

Ingredients/Almond Streusel
4 tbs melted butter
1 cup cake flour
1/2 cup slivered almonds
1/8 tsp salt
3 tbs dark brown sugar
3 tbs granulated sugar
 
Ingredients/Cake
3 eggs
3/4 cup or 1 1/2 sticks of butter
1 cup sour cream
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp salt
2 1/2 cup cake flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 vanilla bean 

For the first component (swirl), start by filling a saucepan with all the ingredients. Place over medium high heat and let cook. Mixture should come to a low boil or simmer. Stir constantly to make sure it does not stick or burn. Once it reduces down to having only 1/3 to 1/4 a liquid amount, remove from heat and take out cinnamon stick and vanilla bean. Discard the two. Transfer cherry mixture to a heat proof bowl and place in refrigerator to cool for a minimum of 20 minutes.

As that cools, create the streusel. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and insure that one rack is on the middle tier of the oven. Using a medium size bowl, mix together the warm melted butter with both types of sugars. Then stir in the salt. Add the flour and combine until no dry streaks remain. Lastly, mix in the almonds. Set aside.

The cake batter starts with the preparation of the 10 inch tube pan. Grease the pan's interior and dust with flour. Fill a sieve (place over a large bowl) with flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Sift dry ingredients into the bowl. Set aside.

Add butter to a bowl of a stand mixer and beat until nice and smooth. Stop at intervals to scrape down the sides. The butter should be lighter in color after beating. Continue to run the mixer at medium high speed and add the sugar in separate intervals. Beat time should be about 5 minutes.

Take the vanilla bean and split down the middle and scrape the seeds into the batter. Mix until well distributed. Add one egg beat for 30 seconds to combine. Repeat the process until all eggs are blended into the batter. Remove the bowl from the stand mixer.

Using a wooden spoon, fold 1/3 of the sifted ingredients into the batter. Add half of the sour cream and stir. Mix in 1/2 of the remaining dry ingredients and then the the rest of the sour cream. Then add the last of the sifted ingredients and blend together. Top the batter with spoonfuls of the cherry swirl, spacing the dollops apart. Carefully fold the swirl mixture into the batter, using only about 4 or 5 strokes. The cherry mixture should be blended to the point of only streaking the batter, not be fully mixed into it.

Transfer the batter to the prepared pan and smooth out evenly. Cover the surface of the batter with the streusel, making sure it is evenly covered. Using clean hands, lightly press streusel against the batter.

Place pan in oven on middle rack an bake until tester comes out clean. This should take about 50 minutes to bake. Once baked, place pan over a rack to cool for about 1 hour. Run a knife around the edges and flip the cake onto a cake board. Flip once again so that streusel is face up. Let cool completely before serving.
                          **LAST YEAR: Italian Cream Filled donuts**         

Upside-down Banana Coffee Cake

I have to admit it, my brain is hard wired. By hard wired, I mean that it is constantly running with heavily detailed thoughts of this and that. I have yet to master the ability to think of nothing or empty my head. Remember the Harry Potter scene where Albus Dumbledore takes his wand and pulls out thoughts from his head and puts them in a magic bowl for future reference? Wish I had a magic bowl these days.

So here I am today, with my brain running in high speed, trying to focus on baking. I had many different ideas come to mind when I stumbled upon this recipe. However, there were some factors that eliminated a lot of the flavor combinations I came up with. One of them was that every fruit is not suitable for the upside-down thing. The other factor is that lately I have been disappointed with the produce department at the grocers. I do need an answer to the billion dollar question-is there really a big demand for rock hard fruit or fruit that will be rotten in the next hour?

Anyhow, the end result was that I still stuck with banana, the chosen fruit that was in the recipe. I bought some of the little or mini bananas for this recipe. I find them to be sweeter than the standard. The conversion was 6 of the little bananas to the 2 medium bananas.

After completion, I decided that the banana was a good choice. Slightly warmed, the pecan topping paired with the bananas over the moist, fluffy layer of cake is a pretty tasty way to start the day. I  think my brain slowed down just a bit when I had my piece, actually allowing me to focus on just how delicious a good slice of coffee cake can be.

Upside Down Banana Coffee Cake
adapted from Southern Living/Sept 2006

Ingredients
2 eggs, separated
3/4 cup milk
1/2 cup sour cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbs rum
1/2 cup or 1 stick of butter( divided into 1/4 cups or half sticks)
3/4 cup white granulated sugar (divided into 1/4 and 1/2 cups)
1 cup light brown sugar
2 cups baking mix (I used Bisquick brand)
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 cup chopped toasted pecans
2 medium ripe bananas 
 
Pull out a 10 inch cast iron skillet and add 1/4 cup of butter. Once melted, use a pastry brush to brush up the side interior of the skillet. Add the rum and swirl the skillet around to make sure the interior bottom is covered evenly with the butter and the rum is mixed in and remove from heat. Top evenly a layer of brown sugar and then an even layer of toasted pecans. Set aside.

Fill a medium size bowl with the remaining butter (1/4 cup) and 1/2 cup of the white sugar. Cream together until light and fluffy. Add one egg yolk and beat for 30 seconds and repeat with the second egg yolk. Using a small bowl, whisk together the milk and the vanilla extract. Then pour it into the butter sugar mixture. Add the sour cream and beat until all is evenly blended. Set aside. Then preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Whisk the cinnamon and baking mix together in another bowl. Then fold this dry mix into the wet egg/milk/sugar batter. Using another bowl, fill with the egg whites. Beat egg whites until they are at the soft peak stage. Continue to beat and as you pour in steady stream of the remaining sugar (1/4 cup). Beat time is complete one the whites are at the stiff peak stage. Fold the beaten egg white/sugar blend into the batter.

Peel the bananas and cut the width in half, forming 2 equal pieces. Take each half and slice lengthwise into three pieces. The end result should be 12 pieces, about 2 1/2- 3 1/2 inches in length. Arrange the pieces on top of the pecans in a spoke pattern. If using mini bananas, just slice each lengthwise into 2 pieces.

Spoon the batter over the bananas and use a spatula to smooth out evenly. Place filled skillet in oven and bake until golden on top and tester comes out clean. This should take about 45-50 minutes.

Once baking is complete, let skillet cool on rack for 10-12 minutes. Then invert onto serving platter or cake board. Serve warm.
                        
Tips and Notes:
1. To make sure the cake to comes out easily, the edge must be loose from the side of the skillet prior to inverting. If after the 10 minute cooling it still seems stuck, run a knife around the edge before inverting.

2. The topping is very sticky, so once inverted do not remove the skillet until after 5 minutes, to make sure gravity works.

3. If your skillet retains a lot of the sticky pecan mixture after cake removal, scrape out and add it to the top of the cooling cake.

5. Do not try to create in another type of pan, the skillet insures a better result when inverting the cake.

6. If you want to decline on purchasing the baking mix, you can use one of the various recipes from the net to create the baking mix blend.

                               **LAST YEAR:Caribbean Bars**
 
 

Cranberry Black Walnut Coffee Cake

Because black walnuts have such a strong flavor, there are not a lot of recipes that use this ingredient. Using this type of nut in a recipe does require the proper balance of flavor, which involves a lot of trial and error. The other consideration is the development of flavor over time. Cookies, for instance, are usually in the cookie jar for a few days before they all disappear.

When I saw this recipe, I was deliberating about using English walnuts instead of the black, but I am glad I chose the black. The black walnuts provided a perfect amount of subtle flavor that was well matched with the cranberry and cinnamon. The moist cake, warm cranberries and crunchy streusel really hit the spot.

I would say that eating things that remind us of the fall makes us happy. The flavors conjure up thoughts of the holiday seasons with family get togethers, sitting in front of the fire and cool crisp days outside. Sometimes we all need an attitude adjustment and a slice of this coffee cake may just be the key-especially on a Monday morning.

Cranberry Black Walnut Coffee Cake
adapted from Better Homes and Gardens Fall Baking

Ingredients/Cake
3 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
4 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup butter, melted
1 cup milk
2 inches stick cinnamon
1 cup apple juice or apple cider
2 cups dried cranberries
1 cup walnuts (black or English), toasted and ground

Ingredients/Streusel
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
2/3 cup flour
3/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 cup chopped walnuts (black or English)
1/3 cup of cold butter, cut into small cubes

Start by making the cranberry topping.  Fill a saucepan with 1/2 cup of the brown sugar, cranberries, stick cinnamon and apple juice (or cider).  Place over medium high heat and stir constantly, letting the mixture come to a boil.  When the sugar has dissolved, lower the heat and let simmer.  As it simmers, the liquid will reduce. It will take about 15 minutes of cooking for the cranberry topping to reach the correct consistency. Remove from heat and discard cinnamon stick. Set the mixture aside and let cool completely before using, this is your first bowl.

Grease the interior of a 10 inch springform pan and preheat the oven to 325 degrees. For the second bowl, sift the cinnamon, flour, salt and baking powder in to this bowl. Add the ground nuts,granulated sugar and remaining 1/2 cup of brown sugar. Stir so all is evenly distributed. Also, set this bowl aside.

Proceed to making the streusel topping by combining the cinnamon, flour and brown sugar together in a small bowl, the third bowl. Add the cubes of butter and use a pastry blender to cut the butter into the sugar mixture. Once no dry streaks remain and mixture can easily clump together, stir in the walnuts.

Get your second bowl and make a well in the center of the dry mixture. Take out a 4th bowl. Crack eggs into this bowl and beat with a fork for about 1 minute. Mix in the melted butter, milk and vanilla. Pour this egg mixture into the well of dry ingredients in the second bowl. Stir until blended and mixture becomes a batter.

For assembly, pour the egg batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top so it is even. Spoon the cranberry mixture (from the first bowl) over the top of the batter, leaving a 1 inch border. Lastly, sprinkle with the walnut streusel topping.

Place pan in oven and let bake until edges are golden brown. Cake will start to pull away from edge of pan when done. Bake time is approximately 1 hour and 15 minutes. Let cool in pan for about 15 minutes before removing the outside ring of pan. Slice and serve warm.
                                    **LAST YEAR:Chocolate Liqueur Suicide Cheesecake**

Strawberry Cream Cheese Coffee Cake

I heard on the radio station the other day that it was National Donut day. I do like donuts quite a bit, but I feel that they could incorporate some fresh fruit into the flavors.  Jelly filled is actually fruit gel, not big chunks of fresh fruit. Donut makers should split a donut and fill it with fresh fruit once in a while, I think it would catch on.  I would definitely be a patron at that donut shop.

That brings me to this particular recipe. It has a blend of fresh fruit, cream cheese and almonds layered on top of sweet cake. The original recipe called for blueberries, but I decided that with almonds and cream cheese, strawberries is a better flavor match.

This breakfast treat is one that never got out of the house. Most of my desserts are brought to the work place or given to the neighbors. It is only test tasted with one serving before moving on.  However, my husband wanted this one for our household and he managed to make it disappear in a few days.

Strawberry Cream Cheese Coffee Cake
adapted from Best Recipes from Country Inns and Bed and Breakfasts

Ingredients
1 cup fresh fruit (any type of summer fruit, with the exception of citrus, chopped if bigger than blueberries)
1 tsp almond extract
3/4 cup plain low fat yogurt
2 plus 1 eggs
1/4 cup apple juice
6 oz cream cheese
2 tsp water
1/2 cup butter
3/4 plus 1/4 cup sugar
2 1/4 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup sliced almonds
1 tsp cornstarch

Grease and flour a 9 inch springform pan. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Fill a small saucepan with fruit and apple juice. Let come to a boil and then reduce heat and stir.  Simmer on low for about 3 minutes. Add the water and sift in the cornstarch.  Stir again and let simmer. The liquid should thicken up and reduce in a short amount of time. When ready, your saucepan contents should measure about a cup of the fruit/cornstarch mixture. Remove from heat and set aside.

Prepare a food processor for use. Fill the processor bowl with 3/4 cup of sugar and flour. Then cut the butter into cubes and drop into bowl. Process until mixture resembles sandy coarse crumbs. Empty contents into large bowl.  Remove one cup of mixture and place in another bowl for a different use.

Sift together baking powder, baking soda and salt. Fold into sugar mixture until distributed evenly.  In a separate bowl, place 2 eggs and the almond extract and whisk together. Add the yogurt and whisk again to blend. Pour into the flour/sugar batter and stir. Once blended, empty contents into prepared springform pan. The batter will be a bit sticky, but flatten on the bottom of pan and bring up the sides about a 1/4 of an inch. There should be a little bit of a well from the dough sides going down to the bottom of the dough.

Take out a medium size bowl and beat together cream cheese, 1/4 cup of sugar and remaining egg until smooth. Fill the well of the dough with the cream cheese mixture and smooth the top. Then spread fruit mixture over top of cream cheese. Find the reserved crumb mixture and stir in sliced almonds. Sprinkle over the top of the coffee cake, making sure it is covered to the edge evenly.

Place in oven and bake until golden brown. This will take about 45 minutes and filling will be set when done. Cool in pan 15 minutes then remove the outer ring of the springform pan.

Tips and Notes:

1. Because of their size, blueberries yield more volume in a cup than chopped strawberries. Next time, I will up the amount of strawberries. The 1 cup turned out to be a little sparse on top.

2. Another good flavor match since this has almonds would be cherries.

3. Be careful when adding ingredients, the eggs as well as the sugar are used in 2 different components so they need to be added separately.

4. The instructions are to spread fruit over cream cheese.  Just to insure that you are not mixing the layers, it is better to drop by spoonfuls.
                         **LAST YEAR:Chocolate Almond Marsala Cookies**

                                          
 

Creme Fraiche Coffee Cake

The "cake" in the word coffeecake can be a misnomer.  There are some coffeecakes that are made with yeast so they turn out to be more of a bread than a cake.  I like both, but I still favor the cake type.

While skimming through recipes, I came to a halt at this one.  The main point that attracted me was that this recipe included creme fraiche.  Having never made anything with that ingredient, I started wondering what impact this ingredient would have on the flavor and texture.

While the creme fraiche is a great component, the careful balance of the selected spices in the streusel does play an important role as well. The end result is a moist cake that stands between the tight crumb of a pound cake and the lightness of a regular cake.  The coffeecake has a mellow flavor of butter and vanilla that overlaps a crunchy pecan and cinnamon streusel.

The batter is placed in the pan first and the streusel is layered on top. In the baking process, the streusel sinks but leaves some brown sugar behind. The brown sugar bakes into a toasty sweet coating that covers the surface of the cake. This recipe makes one 10 round cake and uses a tube cake pan.

Creme Fraiche Coffee Cake
adapted from Flour by Joanne Chang

Ingredients/Streusel
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/8 tsp ground cloves
3 tbs packed light brown sugar
1/3 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup chopped toasted pecans
3 tbs cake flour
2 tbs butter

Ingredients/Cake
3 eggs
1 egg yolk
2 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 cup creme fraiche
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 tsp baking powder
2 tsp baking soda
2 1/2 cups cake flour
1 cup and 2 tbs butter (cubed at room temp)

Prepare a 10 inch tube pan with a removable insert by buttering the interior and dusting with flour.  Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Blending of the streusel can be done with a food processor by pulsing or by using a pasty cutter by hand.  Place all the streusel ingredients in a bowl and blend by either method. The result will be a mixture that is crumbly in texture.  Set aside.

For the cake, sift together the flour, baking soda, salt and baking powder.  Then stir in the granulated sugar.  Pour into the bowl of a stand mixer.  Run the mixer on low and drop in cubes of butter at 30 second intervals.  The mixture will come together as a coarse meal or as a dough after about 3-4 minutes of beating.  The variation is based upon the temperature of the butter and either texture is acceptable.

In a separate bowl, mix the wet ingredients together ( eggs, egg yolk, creme fraiche and vanilla extract) until completely blended.  Add half of this batter to the flour/butter blend and mix on low speed.  Then turn the speed up to medium and beat for 1 1/2 minutes, scraping down sides at two intervals of mixing.  The texture of the batter will become more fluffy and the color much lighter.

Turn the mixer back to low and pour in the rest of the egg/ creme fraiche mixture. Beat for 30 seconds, stopping to scrape down sides a few times.   Scoop out 1 1/2 cups of the batter and fold it into the streusel.

First fill the tube pan with the non streusel batter.  Smooth the top and then layer the streusel batter on top, smoothing to an even layer.  Place pan in oven and bake until cake gets golden in color and springs back when you touch the top.  Cake should be done in about 1 hour and 10 minutes.   Remove and let cake cool in pan for 3 hours.  Then invert cake onto a plate and invert again.  Slice and serve.

Tips and Notes:
1.  My cake sunk in the middle, extra precaution must be made when smoothing on top layer making sure it is even.  The addition of the batter to the streusel prior to layering is supposed to keep this from happening.
2. Even though the streusel sunk to the very bottom of the cake, it did not cause any sticking to the pan.
3.   Do not let the pan size fool you, the cake does not rise as high as the pan.  The cake should range from 3 1/2 to 4 1/2 inches in height.
                                   **LAST YEAR: Banana Whipped Cream Pie**
                                 

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**