Jam Streusel Coffee Cake

This coffee cake is like the Sound of Music in real life.  It’s all about my favorite things.

Jam?  Check.  Streusel?  Check.  Excuse to eat dessert for breakfast?  Check.

Coffee cake is kind of a perfect food.  It is easy to whip up and throw in the oven, leaving you to focus on other things.  It can be made the night before if you’re on a tight schedule in the morning.  It’s fancy enough for a brunch or shower.  It CAN even be a dessert.  And this recipe is particularly great, in that the cake itself is lovely and light and moist and fluffy—helped along by the buttermilk, greek yogurt, and extra egg yolks.

Preheat the oven to 350°F and spray a 9×13 baking pan with nonstick spray.  As noted below, if you want a smaller cake, you can make this in an 8×8 dish and just halve everything.

For the cake, beat the butter, sugar, and vanilla in the large bowl of your stand mixer at medium until light and fluffy (1-2 minutes).  Add the egg and yolk one at a time and beat well, and keep scraping down the sides to make sure everything gets mixed in.

Whisk together the yogurt and buttermilk in a small bowl, and in a separate medium bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.  Take turns adding the liquids and the dry ingredients to the batter in three additions, mixing on low speed in between to incorporate (begin and end with the flour mixture).  Don’t overmix, just get everything incorporated and stop.

Scrape the batter into your prepared pan and smooth.

Pour the jam in a small bowl and microwave briefly (about 10 seconds), then whisk to loosen it up so it’s nice and liquid.  Dollop the jam over the batter.

Using a toothpick or knife or whatever, swirl the jam through the batter.  I swirled up and down length-wise, then turned it and went up and down width-wise as well.  Since I had no idea what I was doing, I was super excited with how pretty it turned out…

Which means it’s time to cover up that pretty jam swirl.  For the streusel, combine the brown sugar, flour, and cinnamon, and chopped pecans if you’re using them.  Add the cubed butter and cut it in with a fork (or pastry cutter, or, let’s be honest, your fingers) until the mixture is crumbly.

Top the cake with the streusel, on top of the jam.  Sorry, this is the worst picture ever.

Bake for 35-45 minutes, until the cake is golden, springs back to the touch, and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.  It’s definitely going to depend on your oven and the pan you bake it in.  The first time I made this it was 38 minutes (in a glass pan) and the second time it was like 45 or possibly more (in a white ceramic pan).

Another terrible picture, I don’t know what was happening both times I made this!

Cool for at least 30 minutes before serving.  For some reason one of the times I made it the jam all sank to the bottom (which I don’t think is normal), but…it still tastes amazing so who cares?!

Jam Streusel Coffee Cake

Note, you can halve this recipe for an 8×8 pan

Streusel

• 2/3 cup of light brown sugar
• 4 tablespoons of flour
• 2 teaspoons of cinnamon
• 1/2 cup of pecans, chopped (optional; I did once with, and once without)
• 4 tablespoons of cold unsalted butter, cubed

Cake

• 3 cups of all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons of baking powder
• 1 teaspoon of baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• 12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) of unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 1 1/3 cups of sugar
• 4 teaspoons of vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs plus 2 egg yolks, at room temperature
• 1 1/3 cups of plain fat-free Greek yogurt, at room temperature
• 2/3 cup of low-fat buttermilk, at room temperature
• 1/2 cup of strawberry jam

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F and spray an 8-inch square baking pan with nonstick spray.  If you want to make a 9×13, just double everything.
2. For the cake, beat the butter, sugar, and vanilla in the large bowl of your stand mixer at medium until light and fluffy (1-2 minutes).  Add the egg and yolk one at a time and beat well.
3. Combine the yogurt and buttermilk in a small bowl, and in a separate medium bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.  Take turns adding the liquids and the dry ingredients in three additions, mixing on low speed in between to incorporate (begin and end with the flour mixture).  Don’t overmix, just get everything incorporated and stop.
4. Scrape the batter into your prepared pan and smooth.  Pour your jam in a small bowl and microwave briefly (about 10 seconds), then whisk to loosen so it’s nice and liquid.  Dollop the jam over the batter and then swirl together with knife or toothpick.
5. For the streusel, combine the brown sugar, flour, cinnamon, and pecans (if you’re using them) in a medium bowl.  Add the cubed butter and cut it in with a fork (or pastry cutter, or your fingers) until the mixture is crumbly.  Top the cake with the streusel, over the jam.
6. Bake for 35-45 minutes, until the cake is golden, springs back to the touch, and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.  The first time I made this it was 38 minutes (in a glass pan) and the second time it was like 45 or possibly more (in a white ceramic pan).  Cool for at least 30 minutes before serving.

Original recipe from Tutti Dolce