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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Whenever I bake or serve an apple pie and my grandmother is around, she always tries to convince me to put cheese on top of it. Cheese - especially cheddar cheese - and apples are a great combination general, so even though it might sound like an odd pairing as far as pie goes, the salty flavor of the cheese goes pretty well with the sweet apple filling of the pie.

That being said, I always just gave my grandmother a slice of cheese to eat alongside her pie and kept mine cheese-free. I simply like pie crust too much to adulterate it by letting cheddar cheese melt all over the top. I’m open to using the cheddar cheese and apple match in other foods, so I opted to include a cheddar cheese layer on top of this apple pie-inspired coffee cake.

The coffee cake has a base of vanilla cake that is topped off with some apples cooked into a kind of homemade apple pie filling. The cake base is tender and has a good flavor, with an almost pound cake-like density that supports all the layers of topping extremely well. The apples are not fully cooked before they are added as a layer to the cake, but getting them started on the stove ensures that they will be fully cooked and tender when the cake is done. It also gave me the opportunity to add some cornstarch to the apples and thicken up their natural juices, preventing them from making the base of the cake soggy. The coffee cake is finished with a crumbly oat topping and, of course, cheddar cheese. The cheese should be added just before the cake comes out of the oven so it has just enough time to melt onto the streusel topping and hold everything together.

If you want to leave the cheese off of this coffee cake, go right ahead. The cheese is a nice change and does go well with apples, but I have to admit that I just can’t help liking the cake (not to mention my apple pie) just as much without the cheese on top. If you leave the topping off, consider serving the cake with a little whipped cream or ice cream to finish it off. (more…)

A good streusel topping is hard to resist. It’s one of the things that makes coffee cakes so popular, and can turn a good muffin into a great one - or at least turn it into one that looks a little more decadent. I’m sure that this is what IHOP was banking on when they introduced some “limited time only” Coffee Cake Pancakes to their menu. The pancakes look delicious on their posters, with layers of pancakes, streusel and whipped cream. As tempted as I was to pull my car over when I spotted a nearby IHOP, I decided to drive on home and put together a completely homemade batch of coffee cake pancakes.

I assumed that IHOP probably used their standard pancake batter for their pancakes, so I set out to base my recipe around the buttermilk pancakes that I usually make. The IHOP pancakes have streusel on top of the pancakes, as well as in the pancakes themselves, so I knew that I would have to make a batch of streusel and bake it off in advance. I modified a streusel that tops one of my favorite coffee cakes, crumbled it onto a baking sheet and baked it in the oven until it was crisp

To make the pancakes, I used a 1/3 cup measure to dollop large amounts of batter onto my griddle, spread the pancake batter (it is fairly thick) gently into circles, and sprinkled some of the pre-baked streusel topping onto the un-cooked side of the pancake. This allows the streusel the chance to cook into the pancake, not just slide off the top. I served these with maple syrup and more streusel topping, leaving the whipped cream to the IHOP version.

The pancakes were soft and fluffy, with a delicious buttermilk-vanilla flavor. The streusel added a fantastic texture and flavor to the pancakes: crunchy, sweet and buttery. It was almost like crumbling up shortbread cookies and sprinkling them into the batter, but probably better because of the spices in the streusel. The pancakes are quite filling - not to mention indulgent - so I would save these for a lazy weekend morning. The streusel can be made in advance and stored in an airtight container if you want to bake it ahead of time and have it on hand.

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