Coffee Cake. Sounds so……1958. When I was growing up my dad had an ever present Entenmanns Crumb Coffee Cake sitting on the counter, bought fresh every Sunday and so stale only he would eat it by Wednesday dipped in coffee. I always dug it. I mean really, as a kid, whats not to like? Its CAKE we were allowed to eat for breakfast.

I haven’t eaten one in forever. The store bought ones just dont look as good as they did when I was 10. I was wandering through Bottom Dollar Foods (New little grocery chain around the area that is good for basics shopping. Good prices from what I have seen so far) and I came across some really pretty blackberries. In February. So I “borrowed” one because even if the deal is good if they taste like ass who cares. They were yummy. I’m still baffled now, but I bought them. No idea what I wanted to do with them but thats a February miracle I wasn’t willing to to pass up.

They’ve been in the fridge a couple days. Then it came to me last night. Blackberry Coffee Cake! See, the Husband works until 3-4am Saturday nights/Sunday mornings. I have recently discovered that it really doesn’t matter what my thoughts are on sleeping I am waking up at 8-8:30 every morning and that is just the way it is. This pissed me off for about a week, but thats just pointless, instead I embrace the quiet early mornings with the monsters. But that combined with Husband’s need to sleep gives me a solid chunk of time to kill Sunday mornings; in my world Brunch occurs around 2pm, dinner at 9ish…we are a couple hours late, basically, all the time. Perfect time to make a coffee cake, though.

This took less than 30 minutes to get into the oven, about 55 minutes to bake at 350, preheat your oven when you get started with the mixing. No pics of the streusel topping this time, but its something I use often. I had a container in the fridge that I used on top of the coffee cake. Still included the recipe, though.

Blackberry Coffee Cake

• 3/4 cup Sugar
• 1/4 cup Butter, softened
• 2 Eggs (large or ex large)
• 1 Tbsp Vanilla Extract
• 2oz Plain, Vanilla or Berry Grek Yogurt (can also even sub sour cream)
• 2 cups Flour
• 2 tsp Baking Powder
• 1/2 tsp Salt (if you use salted butter make it only a pinch)
• 3/4 cup Milk
• 2 cups Blackberries (2 half pint packages)

I used my hand mixer for this one. Cream together the butter and sugar until they are combined and start to lighten up in color, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs 1 at a time, mixing well between additions. Add vanilla and yogurt, mix on medium to combine.

Chef tip – stop sifting. The sole purpose of sifting is to 1) aerate and 2) mix dry ingredients together. It serves a number of purposes in recipes, most of which are textural, but in my experience can be kind of messy. The same thing can be accomplished by whisking your dry ingredients together in a bowl prior to adding them. I do this with the dry ingredients for just about everything I bake; I don’t sift.

So all that said whisk the flour, powder and salt together. Add half of it to the butter mixture and mix to combine. Add half the milk, mix to combine, rest of dry, mix to combine, rest of milk and finish mixing. It will be thick, it’s supposed to be.

Add the berries and fold in with a rubber spatula; the batter will loosen up as you fold, but try not to smash the crap out of the berries. It doesn’t have to be perfectly combined. It should be kind of chunky looking.

Spread evenly into an 9×13 baking dish sprayed with non-stick spray. I used glass, metal is also perfectly fine.

Top with Oatmeal Streusel and bake at 350 for 50-60 minutes – seriously the hardest part was waiting while the house started to smell like awesome. Its done when a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean, it feels firm and the crumb topping is browned and crisped.

It is easiest to make the topping in the food processor, you put all of the ingredients in, pulse it a few times, boom, streusel. I use this on lots – fruit crisps, muffins & quick breads, cookies, pastries…its universally delicious. I also usually use walnuts with pecans coming in a very close second for everyday. It can be mixed up by hand, most important with either method – make sure the butter is cold so it doesn’t get clumpy. I always make too much because I like to have it around. If you have left overs just put them in a tupperware and throw it in the back of the fridge; next time you need/want a dessert on the fly you are all but some cut up fruit away from a crumble.

Oatmeal Streusel 

• 2 sticks Butter, COLD COLD COLD and cubed
• 1 cup Light Brown Sugar
• 1 cup Oatmeal (NOT quick cooking)
• 1 cup Walnuts or Pecans, doesn’t matter how they are cut
• 1 cup Flour
• 1 Tbsp Cinnamon

Put it all in the food processor, pulse it until its is all combined and there are no big chunks of butter. When you crush some up in your hand it should clump together. Use as needed. It will keep in an airtight container for months if kept cold. This recipe will do a 1/4″ thick layer of streusel on top of the coffee cake.

Finished product was, well, awesome. Tender cake, not too sweet, berries were perfect for tart & juiciness, Oatmeal streusel crisps up some and it gets a really nice toasted flavor that I could eat by itself. Sub out any kind of berry or cherry you want for the blackberries, as long as it is fresh. Peaches & apples would also be good.

Get this….the Husband said it was good! Ate a WHOLE piece of it. This is monumental. We had it with lattes for a very late breakfast. Only had to let it sit for around an hour before it was ready to be cut so it was still warm.

Good base recipe for something a little different to do with fruit that really wasn’t super difficult, but damn tasty.