Saturday, June 03, 2006

Blueberry Coffeecake

Prep Time: 20 minutes
Bake Time: 45-50 minutes
Cool Time: 1+ hour

Grade: A

Make Again: Yes

Recipe Source: Everyday Foods, Cook's Illustrated and Me

This recipe is an alteration of a recipe I found in Everyday Foods magazine. I love the original recipe, but the amount of streusal on it is obscene, and not really necessary. In the past, I have always cut that part of the recipe in half. This time, I decided to take a hint from Cook's Illustrated Best Light Recipe, and use melted butter for the streusal instead of cutting in cold butter. This allows you to use a lot less butter. It is a good technique and the streusal turned out very good, and for me it was just the right amount.

I usually get 12 servings for this recipe, instead of 9. With the smaller serving size and the different streusal topping, the calories per piece for this cake end up being about 230 intead of the 405 noted in Everyday Foods. Pretty good!

Blueberry Coffecake

Cake:
1 1/2 cups flour plus 1 teaspoon
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon allspice
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened, plus more for pan
3/4 cup sugar
1 egg
2/3 cup buttermilk
1 1/2 cups blueberries

Steusal:
2 1/2 T. butter, melted
1/3 c. flour
1/3 c. brown sugar
pinch salt
pinch cinnamon

1. Preheat oven to 350°. Butter and flour a 9-inch square baking pan.
2. Topping: Stir together flour, brown sugar, and salt in a small bowl. Stir in melted butter. Small little lumps will form as you stir.
3. In a medium bowl, whisk together 1 1/2 cups flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and allspice.
4. In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar with an electric mixer until fluffy. Add egg; beat well.
5. Add flour mixture and buttermilk alternately until just combined. (Batter will be very stiff.)
6. In a large bowl, toss the blueberries with 1 teaspoon flour. Fold blueberries into the batter; spoon into prepared pan and level out batter.
7. Sprinkle cake with streusel topping.
8. Bake until golden brown and a tester comes out clean, 45-50 minutes. Let cool completely.

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