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Oct 13 2011

Pumpkin Coffee Cake

Posted by HowSweetEats in Baking, Step-by-Step Recipes

It seems that I wait all year for pumpkin. Come May, I am already craving pumpkin cookies, pumpkin roll, and pumpkin pie, and can hardly imagine waiting another four or five months to get in on that goodness. And with the recent pumpkin shortages that have been happening around the country, I sort of bought every can at my store. Like, every single can. My downstairs pantry now has a dedicated pumpkin shelf and I couldn’t be happier. And hungrier.

I’ve had Heather’s recipe saved for Pumpkin Coffee Cake with Brown Sugar Glaze since last autumn, so you know exactly what came first on my to-make list. If I’m being honest, it’s the brown sugar glaze that sold me. I have a weird thing for brown sugar and for glazes, so I knew it would be a winner. I could practically taste it through through the screen. And it’s easy too!

You need a can of pumpkin puree, a box of yellow cake mix, pumpkin pie spice, baking soda, vanilla extract, heavy cream, flour, granulated sugar, brown sugar, butter, eggs and water. Heather’s recipe called for walnuts, and as I much as I love them, I’m a firm believer in nutless baked goods. Feel free to add them if you wish!

Begin by adding the pumpkin, eggs, vanilla extract, water and pumpkin pie spice together in a bowl.

Mix it up until it looks pumpkin-y … or, you know, sort of like baby food.

Add in the cake mix and baking soda, and mix with a spoon until combined and minimal lumps remain. It’s okay if you have a few small lumps left.

Pour batter into a 9×13 greased baking dish.

In a small bowl, mix together half of the brown sugar, flour and melted butter. If you are using walnuts, this is where they would go. Pecans would add a nice touch too.

Crumble the brown sugar mixture over the pumpkin cake batter with your fingers.

It should look like this. Absolutely devour-able.

The cake heads into a 350ºF oven and bakes for about 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

While the cake is baking, combine heavy cream, brown sugar, granulated sugar and vanilla extract in a small saucepan.

Mix to combine and bring it to a simmer, then remove from heat and continuously stir until all of the sugar has dissolved. Set it aside until ready to use.

It will become all glazy and be nearly impossible to stay away from. I wanted to pour it in a mug and drink it.

Once the cake comes out of the oven, poke holes all over the top with a toothpick. Or in my case, a fondue sticker thingy. You can also use a fork.

Drizzle glaze over cake evenly…

Then let cool for about 20-30 minutes, or until just slightly warm. It tastes best warm, trust me.

Serve yourself (and um, your guests?) a big square slice …

And go to town. Oh man. This cake is unreal.

You won’t believe how delicious it is, and it fits the bill for breakfast and dessert. The crunchy, gooey top is my favorite part and I can’t imagine a better treat for fall.

Thanks so much to Heather for the fabulous recipe! Be sure to check out her blog, Heather’s Dish, where she serves up delectable food with a side of humor and love.

Printable Recipe

Pumpkin Coffee Cake with Brown Sugar Glaze

by Heather Disarro on October 9, 2010 in Cakes, Desserts

See post on Heather Disarro’s site!

4.90 Mitt(s) 29 Rating(s) 29 votes, average: 4.90 out of 5

Description

Light and fluffy coffee cake made the decadent way with a cream-and-butter brown sugar glaze. Feel free to thank me for the sugar coma later.

Ingredients

⅓ cups Water
1 can Pureed Pumpkin (15 Oz)
2 whole Eggs
1 Tablespoon Vanilla Extract
2 teaspoons Pumpkin Pie Spice
1 box Yellow Cake Mix (18 Ounce Box)
1 teaspoon Baking Soda
1 cup Brown Sugar, Divided
½ cups Flour
⅓ cups Walnuts, Chopped
4 Tablespoons Butter, Melted
¼ cups Granulated Sugar
1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
¼ cups Heavy Whipping Cream

Preparation Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350F.

In a large bowl mix together the water, pumpkin, eggs, 1 Tablespoon of vanilla, and pumpkin pie spice until well combined. Add the cake mix and baking soda and mix until just combined.

Grease a 9×13 pan with butter and pour batter into pan.

In a small bowl mix together 1/2 cup of brown sugar, 1/2 cup flour, walnuts, and melted butter. Use fingers to sprinkle over the top of the cake. Bake at 350 for 25-30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

For the glaze, combine the other 1/2 cup brown sugar, granulated sugar, 1 teaspoon vanilla, and heavy cream in a saucepan and bring to a simmer. Remove from heat and stir until all sugar is dissolved.

When cake is finished baking, poke holes in the top with a toothpick. Pour glaze over the cake, making sure to cover all surfaces. Serve cake warm or at room temperature.

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Jessica Merchant is a personal trainer turned food writer and blogger. Her blog, How Sweet Eats, is where she proclaims her love for all things sweet, all things bacon, and everything else in between. She works her magic in her Pittsburgh kitchen, which she shares with her husband of 2 years.

Oct 19 2011

Easy Flaky Buttery Biscuits

Posted by callimakesdo in Baking, Step-by-Step Recipes

A warm biscuit is comfort food, plain and simple.

Being from the Mountain West, biscuits aren’t exactly a staple at our dinner table. (My mom did make homemade buttermilk biscuits occasionally, to accompany cabbage rolls—one of my favorite childhood dinners.)

But my husband is half Southern; his mother’s family is from Tennessee, and some things must be in the blood. He loves a good biscuit.

Happy to oblige his craving, I was supremely confident the first time I ever attempted biscuits. I loved mixing and rolling them and especially cutting them out with my brand new biscuit cutter.

But when my biscuits came out of the oven, they looked alarmingly flat. To my dismay (and shock), my biscuits tasted more like hockey pucks than the light, buttery biscuits I’d expected.

I’m not the sort to give up easily, so I tried several different recipes … and got varying degrees of the same result.

Biscuits are my nemesis, I decided, and I’d be better off with biscuits from a pop can, if I ever made them again.

But my failure niggled at me. It’s just a biscuit after all, made from simple ingredients and simple tools. So when I spotted the recipe for Easy, Flaky, Buttery Biscuits from ranchinmom2five on Tasty Kitchen, I thought I’d attempt to make my husband happy and conquer my biscuit challenge.

The “easy” in the recipe sounded encouraging. So did the great reviews.

Here’s how I finally made a biscuit worthy of serving to my family instead of the garbage pail.

Start with all-purpose flour. The recipe does not specify sifting, but sifted flour is lighter, and I was aiming to avoid my infamous hockey pucks.

Add baking powder, sugar, cream of tartar and salt.

Give the mixture a good stir to make sure the ingredients are well incorporated.

The recipe calls for cold butter. I like to cube it to make the cutting in easier. I’ve made this recipe several times and the last time, I substituted half of the butter for lard. It made a great recipe even better. They were my lightest, tallest, flakiest biscuits ever. If you have lard on hand, give it a try.

Using a pastry cutter or your hand, cut the butter into the flour until pea-sized pieces of butter remain. Don’t overwork the cutting in. Just like with pie dough, this is the key to a flaky biscuit.

The recipe calls for milk, but I love the flavor of buttermilk. So, I substituted 1-1/4 cup buttermilk (since buttermilk is thicker than milk) for the milk.

In a small separate bowl, whisk the egg into the milk.

Pour the milk into the flour mixture.

Stir together with a fork just until the mixture forms a loose ball. Again, don’t over stir here. It’s okay if all the flour isn’t incorporated, it’s going to be messy.

Turn your dough onto a floured counter. I’m using my favorite pastry frame instead of the counter. Knead lightly just a couple of times to form a round.

Pat down till the dough is 3/4″ thick. The recipe advises against using a rolling pin, since the biscuits will be less flaky.

Using a biscuit cutter, cut rounds out. Here’s a tip: As hard as it is to resist, don’t twist the cutter when cutting your rounds. Pressing straight down without twisting helps your biscuit rise easier in the oven and keeps them light.

Place on an ungreased cookie sheet. The other trick I’ve found, after making this recipe a few times, is to crowd them a bit when placing them on the pan. They spread more when they are spaced out and are taller when more crowded.

Bake at 450ºF. The recipe says for 10 -14 minutes. I cooked them for 15 -16 minutes in my oven, until they were golden brown. Rub the tops with a little butter if you are feeling sassy.

Finally I have a recipe for biscuits that I can be proud to serve! They are everything the name promises: light, buttery, flaky, EASY and good.

Biscuits are so quick and easy, you can whip them up in no time. They are perfect for breakfast with gravy or with butter and homemade jam. They are so fast, you can even whip them up on a weeknight.

Thank you ranchinmom2five for rescuing my baking reputation and sharing this wonderful recipe with us.

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