Coffee cake

Years ago, when I was studying in Milan, I got used to take coffee in a famous American bakery close to Duomo church and the University. The coffee time often turned out in cake time and my choice usually was a square of coffee cake, a thick and dense flat cake, covered with crumble and blueberries or raspberries. Coffee is not in the list of the ingredients, but this cake is particularly delicious if you eat it with a hot cup of American coffee. I’ve never found the recipe of that cake, so when came up in mind I immediately wanted to try to find it out, playing around with some leftovers in my fridge. The result is pretty far away from the original: my version is lighter, the cake is dense and bit chewy and the crumbs is nicely crispy, as I like. I adore this kind of cake, you can experiment in so many different ways, as long as you keep the cake flat, and the crumble on the top. I’m looking foreword to try other versions of that!

Coffee cake

For the cake

    • 125 gr plain flour (00 type – T405)

    • 50 gr almond flour

    • two eggs

    • 80 gr caster sugar

    • 50 gr unsalted butter, melted

    • 125 gr sour cream

    • 100 gr fruit compote (apple, pear, apricot, etc.)

    • half teaspoon baking powder

    • Lemon juice

Heat the oven to 180°C. Place the eggs in a medium bowl, add the sugar and the melted butter and stir together. Add the sour cream, the lemon juice and the almond flour. Sift together flour and baking powder and pour into the eggs mixture. Pour into a tin cake - for me squared one – lined with parchment and set aside.

For the crumble

    • 35 gr chilled unsalted butter

    • 35 gr caster sugar

    • 30 gr oat

    • 20 gr all purpose flour

    • 30 gr unpeeled chopped almond 

    • lemon zests

    • 125 gr raspberries

    • 50 gr white chocolate

In a medium bowl place all the ingredients, except for raspberries and the white chocolate, and stir together, working with the top of the fingers until forming crumbs. Cover the dough with raspberries and the with chocolate coarsely chopped. Spread evenly the crumble over the cake and bake for 45 minutes, even more, check with a stick.