Blueberry Coffee Cake

This blueberry coffee cake was borne of my love of a deal. I just couldn't pass up two pints of blueberries for $4. BUT Big. Mr. and I could not possibly eat two pints of blueberries before they went bad. So - I made a cake. This not only permitted me to use my blueberries, but also satisfied Big Mr.'s insatiable desire for baked goods.

In keeping with my promise to you readers, rather than just breaking out my one cup measure and tossing things into a bowl, I measured and wrote things down. And I was rewarded with a pretty darn good cake. The cake is light, moist and slightly tangy, thanks to the yogurt and cake and pastry flour. The lemon juice and zest set the blueberries off nicely (I've rarely encountered a fruit that was not made more "fruit-y" by the addition of some lemon juice). 

I did think that perhaps the sugar in the recipe could have been scaled back further, and I would do the topping differently. Unlike most coffee cakes that use flour in their crumb topping, in true Little Ms. fashion, I decided to substitute regular flour for almond flour (ground almonds). I then sprinkled this mixture on top of the prepared cake batter. As you can see from the photos below, when the cake went into the oven, the topping was perched nicely atop the light yellow batter. However, about fifteen minutes into baking, my beautiful topping was consumed by the rich cake batter and became buried a ribbon of cinnamon-infused almonds, rather than a crunchy crumb topping. The result was by no means disastrous. The recipe for this cake is a keeper, although next time I would adhere to convention and make a more traditional crumb topping so that it does in fact, remain a topping. 

Tossing the blueberries with 2 tablespoons of flour before adding to the batter would prevent them from sinking to the bottom. I did not do this, but if you'd like to prevent the bottom of your cake from seeing all the blueberry action, you should consider it. 

Blueberry Coffee Cake

Cake

1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened

1 cup, packed, light brown sugar (you could easily use only 3/4 cup sugar here)

3 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

2 tbsp fresh lemon juice

1 tbsp lemon zest

1 1/2 cups low fat yogurt

3 cups plus 2 tbsp cake and pastry flour, seperated

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 pint of blueberries, washed and dried 

Additional butter for greasing the pan

Topping

As mentioned above, for this to actually remain a topping, I'd advised substituting the ground almonds for regular all-purpose flour or, sprinkling the topping on the cake with about 20 minutes left in the baking time

1/4 cup almond flour (ground almonds)

1/3 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup slivered almonds, toasted

1 tsp cinnamon

2 tbsp unsalted butter, softened

Grease the pan that you're going to bake your cake in. I used an angel food cake pan, only because Big. Mr. and I got one for our wedding and I've yet to use it. Any pan would probably work for this cake, however, its quite a large amount of batter so I'd suggest using a deep dish 9 inch pie plate, or an 9 x13 pan or 2 loaf pans. A bunt pan would also work. Whatever your weapon of choice, grease that baby up well!

Make the topping. Combine almond flour (or regular flour) with sugar and cinnamon. Mix in sliver almonds. Mix in butter using your fingers to pinch together the butter with the other dry ingredients. Topping should resemble wet sand when done. Set topping aside.

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. 

In a large bowl using an electric mixer, cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Beat in eggs, one at a time, allowing each egg to become fully incorporated before adding the next. Add lemon zest and juice and vanilla and mix on low . Add in yogurt and beat on low until all wet ingredients are fully incorporated.

In separate bowl, whisk together 3 cups of flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

Add half of flour mixture to the wet ingredients and mix on low until just incorporated. Scrape down bowl using rubber spatula. Add the remaining flour and mix on low until the remaining flour is just incorporated. 

In bowl from dry ingredients, toss the blueberries with 2 tbsp flour.

Pour half the batter into prepared pan. Sprinkle with floured blueberries. Top with remaining cake batter. If you'd like, crown your cake with topping now, keeping in mind my above warning about cinnamon-almond rivers. 

Bake the cake in the middle of the pre-heated oven for about 50 mins for an angel food cake pan. If you reserved your topping, check on the cake about 30 mins into baking and top with your prepared topping mix. Continue to bake for 20 more minutes or until wooden skewer inserted into the cake comes out with just a few crumbs clinging to it.

If you use a smaller pan, like a loaf pan, I would begin checking the cake for doneness at around 25 mins. 

Suggestions

A rhubarb coffee cake would be divine. If using rhubarb, try substituting 1/2 tsp ground ginger for the cinnamon. Apples or strawberries would be delicious too.