A Sock-it-to-me-Cake is a type of coffee cake that has a pecan, cinnamon and brown sugar filling that is baked in a bundt or ring pan. It is moist and almost always made with a generous amount of sour cream. It is also almost always made with a yellow cake mix, preferably a Duncan Hines brand mix. With the cake mix, the recipe is very easy and fast to put together. As easy as it may be, I still like to have a from-scratch version of the recipe available to me, so I put one together that bakes a very similar Sock-it-to-Me cake without the mix.

Cake mix cakes are designed to be very tender and moist, and this cake is, too. I used cake flour, rather than all purpose, to give it an even lighter and more cake-mix-like texture than it might otherwise have. I also used a combination of butter and vegetable oil in the cake. The vegetable oil, along with a good portion of sour cream, gives it some extra moisture and helps to keep the cake tasting fresh even a few days after baking. The butter helps the tenderness of the cake, but more importantly, it lends a really nice flavor to everything. This cake has a good, light texture and a soft crumb. I baked it in a tube pan because it’s so easy to get a cake out of a pan with removable sides. That said, you could easily bake this in a bundt pan instead.

The filling for this coffee cake is not a streusel, which many coffee cakes have. Instead it is a mixture of cinnamon, toasted pecans and brown sugar. It is a bit dry on its own and may seem to be too strongly cinnamon flavored before you put it into the cake. Don’t worry too much about this because the cake is relatively plain and all of that cinnamon in the filling really balances out well with the rest of the cake when you’re eating it. Speaking of cinnamon, I also added some cinnamon to the glaze on top of this cake, which adds a little extra sugar and spice to each bite.

This cake is great in the morning with coffee and is equally good served with dessert. As coffee cakes go, it is very easy to throw together because you don’t need to fuss with streusel or any special fillings, just a simple and flavorful mix that comes together in a few seconds before going into the cake.

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Calling something a coffee cake is, more often than not, just an excuse to eat cake for breakfast. I don’t need an excuse to eat cake for breakfast, but I am a huge fan of coffee cake nevertheless. This coffee cake does have a little bit of redeeming nutritional value so, just in case you ever feel guilty reaching for that second slice with your morning coffee, you can bake this up and not think twice about it. The coffee cake is made with whole grain flour and is packed with antioxidant-rich cherries. Of course, it is also buttery, tender and topped off with a crispy cinnamon streusel, too.

This coffee cake is very easy to make because the streusel and the batter start off with the same base. You simply set some of the mixture of flour, butter and sugar aside after mixing them together for the streusel and add it back before baking. The cake is very soft, tender and moist. It does have a subtle whole wheat flavor to it, but it doesn’t have any of the heaviness that you might associate with whole wheat baked goods. Since the butter is blended in with the flour, it really gives the cake a lovely light, even texture. White whole wheat flour is the best choice for this recipe because it has a slightly milder flavor than regular whole wheat and makes for a slightly sweeter streusel. If you don’t have it, I would opt for a 50/50 mix of whole wheat flour and all purpose.

You can use fresh cherries, jarred cherries or frozen cherries for this recipe. With frozen cherries, you can either defrost and drain then before adding, or simply add a minute or two to the baking time to account for the face that they will make the batter a littler colder than fresh cherries will. I like sweet black cherries and Morello cherries, but even very tart cherries are a good option for this recipe if you like things a little less sweet. As it is, this is not a particularly sweet coffee cake - just sweet enough to keep you wanting more.

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Sweet potato pie is probably the most obvious choice of baked good when it comes to sweet potatoes, but these veggies are surprisingly versatile and it’s worth branching out from the standard to try other recipes, like Sweet Potato Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies or this Sweet Potato Coffee Cake with Dried Cranberries. This is one of my new fall favorites, and a great addition to a holiday brunch menu. I’d use canned sweet potato puree (plain, unsweetened) if I were going to bake a batch just before a big holiday meal and homemade cooked sweet potato puree (unseasoned) as a way to use up leftovers after the feast.

The coffee cake is easy to put together, with a moist cake base and a crisp streusel topping. The sweet potato contributes a lovely orange color and a round, naturally sweet flavor to the cake, but it’s biggest impact is on the texture. Compared to a plain coffee cake, this version is more moist and a bit denser. Much like the denseness in a pound cake, the finished cake actually tastes very rich, not heavy, because it is very tender. The dried cranberries add in some additional sweetness to the cake and add a little bit of texture, too.

Since I wanted the flavor of the sweet potato to really shine, I only added spices to the streusel topping. This adds just a hint of spice to the coffee cake and doesn’t overpower the natural taste of the sweet potato.  By this, I really mean that it keeps it from tasting like just another cinnamon-spiced coffee cake! The cake will keep well for a couple of days when stored in an airtight container, so feel free to make this a day or two ahead so you have something to munch on - or serve to company - as you keep the kitchen turning out tasty treats over the holidays.
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I like kiwifruit, but they’re not always at the top of my produce list when I go out shopping. They’re more of an afterthought, something I buy when they look good or if I want something colorful to add to a fruit salad. This is a shame because the berries have a delicious and unique flavor to them. They’re sweet-tart and hard to describe, but if pressed I’d say that they have a hint of mild citrus, ripe berries and sometimes an almost melon note to them. They have a hint of crunch from their seeds, but are soft overall and can easily be scooped with a spoon. And, of course, they have a fantastic green color to them

All these elements help to make kiwi a good choice for the fruit salad I mentioned: color, texture and unique flavor that plays well with other fruits. They also make kiwi a good choice for other fruity dishes, like this simple buttermilk cake. I used both kiwis and raspberries in the cake, so there is a lot of berry flavor in the finished cake and it stands out nicely against the vanilla-buttermilk background. Since there is a good amount of fruit in this cake, I leave it unfrosted and serve it as a coffee cake. It’s also nice with a dusting of powdered sugar.

The cake is sweet and tender. It is moist on its own, but gets a lot of extra moisture from the berries mixed into the batter. Be sure to peel the kiwifruit well before chopping them up, as the tough, hairy skin is not ideal in a cake. Be sure that they are ripe and slightly soft under firm pressure for the best flavor. For the raspberries, you can use fresh or frozen, whatever is more easily available.

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Apples are often associated with fall, but apple trees are often ripe with fruit early into summer (depending on climate and weather conditions) and when you know someone with an apple tree who generous enough to save some for you to bake with, you can’t say no just because apples aren’t quite as “summery” as strawberries are. Apples are delicious all year round and this coffee cake is, too. It is so packed with fruit that it borders on being an apple crisp, held together with a little bit of cake batter - which isn’t a bad thing, of course! It means that the cake is very moist and very flavorful. It also means that it isn’t quite as filling as some more bread-like coffee cakes, so it is easy to make room for a second slice.

Since the cake reminded me of other fruit-heavy desserts, I decided to take a cue from my Nectarine and Cherry Brown Betty and make a crumb topping for the cake that is literally a crumb topping. It is made with bread crumbs, finely processed and mixed with some melted butter and brown sugar. The breadcrumbs make for a very simple topping that has a great flavor and texture. I was very generous with the amount of crumbs I used to top the cake because I tend to enjoy the topping on coffee cakes just as much as the actual cake portion!

Check this coffee cake with a toothpick to test for doneness. It is easy to undercook it very slightly in the center because there is so much fruit in it giving off extra liquid into the batter as the cake bakes. Fortunately, in the event that you overbake it a bit, the fruit also keeps the cake very moist. This will keep well for a day or two at room temperature, and also refrigerates (covered, in an airtight container) well for a day or two if you live somewhere too hot to keep food out on the counter.

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Sometimes a really simple cake is best, and that is usually how I classify a coffee cake. Even though they generally have a streusel or crumb topping, the cakes don’t need any frosting and never require the same time commitment that a layer cake does. It is also nice that coffee cake lends itself to many different flavor variations, so no matter how simple, it is never boring.

This coffee cake is a plain vanilla buttermilk cake with chocolate chips mixed into the batter and topped with cinnamon streusel. It straddles the line between a breakfast cake and a dessert cake for two reasons. First, the chocolate is a desserty addition because coffee cakes often stick with fruit - blueberries, strawberries, etc. - as a mix-in. Second, the texture of this cake is quite rich. It has a tight, tender crumb, and almost seems to melt into your mouth as you eat it. The vanilla comes through in the finished cake, but you also taste the richness of the butter and buttermilk in the batter. The streusel topping, which is also buttery, contributes to this.

Speaking of the topping, this is not the kind of cake that has an extra-thick layer of crumb topping. The streusel mix just about cover the top, adding a bit of extra sweetness and some great texture to the cake. Even though I’m a big fan of topping on coffee cakes, I think that this amount of streusel was just right for this particular cake.

You can use any 9-inch round cake pan for this coffee cake. The cake can be cooled right in the pan and served from it, so there is no need to worry about trying to pry it out of the pan before you slice it. That said, it’s nice to use a springform pan if you have one because it gives you the ability to remove the sides of the pan - making it that much easier to slice and serve.

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