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Two sisters who love to bake...

Classic Coffee Cake

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Classic Cinnamon Coffee Cake.

A classic recipe for cinnamon coffee cake. I first started making this year many years ago in high school. I have changed it a little since then but this is my go to recipe for an easy coffee cake. The cake turns out really moist and to me it is not overly sweet. The original recipe called for 1 cup of sugar instead of 1/2 cup which you find in the recipe below.

This is a small batch coffee cake that bakes in a 8×8″ baking dish. The original version was for double and made in a 9×13″ pan but I usually don’t need such a large batch. I usually make the recipe below then cut it into 9 square pieces.

  • ½ cup (1 stick) salted butter, softened
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1 large egg
  • ¼ cup sour cream
  • ¼ cup plain or vanilla yogurt
  • ¼ teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 cup all-purpose flour
  • ½ teaspoon baking powder
  • ⅛ teaspoon baking soda
  • Topping:
  • 2 Tablespoons brown sugar
  • 2 Tablespoons white sugar
  • 1 teaspoons ground cinnamon
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 350 F. degrees. Grease a 8×8 inch square baking pan & set aside.
  2. Stir together the butter & sugar in a large bowl. Add the egg, sour cream, yogurt & vanilla, and mix well.
  3. Stir in the flour, baking powder, & baking soda together and mix until well combined.
  4. Topping: In a small bowl stir the brown sugar, white sugar and cinnamon together.
  5. Pour the batter into the greased baking pan (I use the back of a spoon to spread it out so it’s all laying evenly). Using a spoon sprinkle the topping over the batter in the pan. Take a knife and swirl the cinnamon topping in.
  6. Bake at 350 F. for about 30 minutes or until a wooden toothpick comes out clean after being inserted into the center. Cool a few minutes before serving.
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Cinnamon Swirl Crumb Coffee Cake in a Loaf Pan

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Cinnamon Swirl Crumb Coffee Cake in a Loaf Pan.

Cinnamon Swirl Crumb Coffee Cake made in a loaf pan. My favorite kind of breakfast. I love coffee cakes!

Photos below show the process. The photo on the left is adding the cinnamon swirl part of the dough in the middle. The photo on the right shows the crumb topping added.

 

Look at all that crumb topping! Crumb topping is my favorite.

 

Cinnamon Swirl Crumb Coffee Cake in a Loaf Pan
 
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Recipe type: Dessert
Ingredients
  • -For Crumb Topping-
  • 1¼ Tablespoons granulated sugar
  • 1¼ Tablespoons packed brown sugar
  • ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • 2 Tablespoon salted butter, melted
  • ¼ cup + 2 Tablespoons all purpose flour (may need a little more)
  • -For The Cake-
  • 1¼ cups all purpose flour
  • ½ cup granulated sugar
  • ¼ teaspoon baking soda
  • 6 tablespoons salted butter, softened
  • 1 large egg
  • 1 egg yolk
  • ⅓ cup plain (or vanilla) yogurt or buttermilk
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon (for cinnamon swirl)
Instructions
  1. Make the crumb topping: combine sugars, cinnamon, melted butter, & flour; stir well. If your crumb topping is still too wet add a little more flour. You want it to be a consistency you can easily crumble between your fingers. Set aside.
  2. Preheat oven to 325 F. Grease a 9x5" loaf pan.
  3. Using an electric mixer mix flour, sugar, salt, & baking soda together. Add butter & mix. Mixture will become crumbly looking & a little dry. Add egg, egg yolk, yogurt/buttermilk, & vanilla. Beat until light & fluffy.
  4. Pour ⅓rd of mixture into greased 9x5" baking pan using a rubber spatula to smooth it out.
  5. Pour ⅓rd of batter into a small bowl and mix in 1 teaspoon cinnamon. Then pour into baking pan. Then cover with the last ⅓rd of batter. Take a butter knife and run it down the centerlength wise to add a swirl.
  6. Add crumb topping by using your fingers to break apart the crumbs & sprinkle them over the batter.
  7. Bake for 45-50 minutes, until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.
  8. Let cool for 30 minutes, remove from pan.

 

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Chocolate Chip Muffins

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Chocolate Chip Muffins.

Chocolate Chip Muffins. What is the difference between chocolate chip muffins and cupcakes? I really don’t know so I didn’t know whether to call these muffins or cupcakes. They seem kind of interchangeable when it comes to chocolate chip but it seems muffin is the more classic term.

Recipe makes about 16 muffins. You can make a small batch of 8 muffins if you cut the recipe in half.

These muffins are soft, sweet, and filled with mini chocolate chips.

Chocolate Chip Muffins
 
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Recipe type: Dessert
Serves: 18
Ingredients
  • 1¾ cups all-purpose flour
  • 1½ teaspoon baking powder
  • ½ teaspoon baking soda
  • ½ teaspoon salt
  • ¼ cup unsalted butter, softened
  • 1 cup granulated sugar
  • 2 large eggs
  • ¼ cup soybean oil or vegetable oil
  • ⅓ cup sour cream
  • 1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
  • ⅔ cup milk
  • 1 cup mini chocolate chips plus more for sprinkle tops
  • coarse sugar for sprinkling over top -optional-
Instructions
  1. Preheat the oven to 350 F. degrees. Line cupcake pan with paper liners or grease cupcake pan.
  2. In a large mixing bowl combine all ingredients together except chocolate chips. Mix for 1-2 minutes until everything is mixed up well.
  3. Hand stir in the chocolate chips.
  4. Fill cupcake liners ⅔rd full.
  5. Sprinkle tops with extra chocolate chips and sugar if desired.
  6. Bake for 16-17 minutes or until done. Test by inserting a toothpick in center of a cupcake until it comes out clean.
  7. Remove from oven & let cool in pan for a few minutes then move to a wire rack to finish cooling.

 

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Dairy Free Biscuits Made with Water

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Dairy Free Biscuits Made with Water (no milk).

I make a lot of dairy free recipes due to someone having a milk dairy allergy that I cook for. I hate to use recipes that call for weird kinds of milk that I never buy so I try to use water instead. Like my dairy free pancake recipe this biscuit recipe calls for water as a substitute. I think they turn out even better tasting with water!

      

Above are some photos of the process. We cut them pretty thick, about 1″ high. We placed them close together on the cookie sheet in rows of 2. My sister is better at making these then me so I had her help. You will have some scrap dough after cutting the biscuits out, you can smoosh it together and cut some more biscuit shapes they just won’t look as pretty.


Dairy Free Biscuits Made with Water
 
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Recipe type: Breakfast
Serves: 8
Ingredients
  • 2 cup all purpose flour
  • 3 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • ⅓ cup vegetable oil
  • ⅔ cup water
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 450 F.
  2. Grease a baking sheet or line with nonstick baking mat.
  3. Mix flour, baking powder and salt together in bowl. Create a hole in the center, add vegetable oil and water. Mix until it forms a loose dough. (Don't over mix).
  4. Knead the dough by hand in the mixing bowl about 5 times, folding the dough over and repeating about 5 times.
  5. On a lightly floured surface gently pat down dough until about 1" thick. Use a biscuit cutter to cut into round circles. Place next to each other on baking sheet.
  6. Bake on greased cookie sheet for about 12-15 minutes or until edges are just starting to brown.

 

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Coffee Cake

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Coffee Cake.

Another Coffee Cake recipe! We have a variety of coffee cake recipes posted on our blog. My sister even has a Chocolate Chip Coffee Cake recipe posted if you are a chocolate lover. Cinnamon coffee cakes are my favorite and crumb cakes.

This recipe makes a square 8×8″ pan of coffee cake which I usually cut into 9 square pieces to serve.

Coffee Cake
 
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Ingredients
  • -For The Cake-
  • 1¼ cups all purpose flour
  • ½ cup granulated sugar
  • ¼ teaspoon baking soda
  • pinch of salt
  • 6 tablespoons salted butter, softened
  • 1 egg
  • 1 egg yolk
  • ⅓ cup plain (or vanilla) yogurt or buttermilk
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • -Topping-
  • 3 Tablespoons brown sugar
  • 2 Tablespoons white sugar
  • 1 teaspoons ground cinnamon
Instructions
  1. Make the topping: In a small bowl combine sugars and cinnamon; stir well. Set aside.
  2. Preheat oven to 325. Grease an 8x8" baking dish.
  3. Using an electric mixer mix flour, sugar, salt, & baking soda together. Add butter & mix. Mixture will become crumbly looking & a little dry. Add egg, egg yolk, yogurt/buttermilk, & vanilla. Beat until light & fluffy.
  4. Pour mixture into greased baking pan using a rubber spatula to smooth it out.
  5. Add cinnamon topping by sprinkling it over the top.
  6. Bake for 30-35 minutes, until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.
  7. Let cool for 30 minutes

 

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Pancake Bread

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Pancake Breakfast Bread.

Pancake Bread Trader Joe’s copycat Recipe. You could serve this buttered with maple syrup drizzled on top like pancakes!


I was recently shopping at a Trader Joe’s grocery store. I don’t have one in town so it is always a treat to be able to go to one when I’m out of town! I love to look at their unique items. This time I noticed something called Pancake Bread in the bread aisle and it looked like a coffee cake style bread and piqued my curiosity. I love coffee cakes, I have quite a few recipes posted for different types on this blog.

I tried to make this recipe using everyday ingredients because I hate making recipes that require a special trip to the grocery store for an item I will probably not be able to use up before it expires. I know a lot of the copycat recipes call for malted milk powder but that is something I’d never even heard of so I avoided using it. Forgive me if it doesn’t taste like Trader Joe’s without it but I was trying to keep it simple.

I baked this in a Pyrex 1.5 quart glass baking dish(affiliate link), about 9×5″.

Pancake Bread
 
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Ingredients
  • -Crumb Topping-
  • 2 Tablespoons salted butter (melted)
  • 1½ Tablespoons sugar
  • 1½ Tablespoons packed brown sugar
  • ⅓ cup + 1 Tablespoon all purpose flour
  • ⅛ teaspoon cinnamon
  • -Bread-
  • ½ cup sugar
  • ⅓ cup salted butter (softened)
  • 1 large egg
  • ½ cup whole milk (or buttermilk)
  • ¼ cup real maple syrup
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1½ cups All-Purpose Flour (I used King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose)
  • ½ teaspoon baking soda
  • pinch of salt
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 350 F. degrees. Grease a 9x5 loaf pan and set aside.
  2. Prepare the crumb topping by melting the butter and pouring it into a bowl with the sugar, brown sugar, flour, and cinnamon. Mix until it becomes crumbly. Set aside.
  3. Prepare the bread batter by mixing the softened butter and sugar together in a bowl. Mix in egg and vanilla. Mix in milk and maple syrup.
  4. Add flour, salt and baking soda and stir well.
  5. Pour bread batter into prepared loaf pan.
  6. Take the crumb topping and sprinkle over the top of the batter evenly.
  7. Bake for 45-50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in middle comes out clean.
  8. Cool in pan for at least 15 minutes then gently remove. Optional: Serve with butter & maple syrup.

 

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