RCP: Espresso Cinnamon Coffee Cake or Muffins

[Jenise]

One of the biggest hits of last weekend's big breakfast was the coffee cake we served. I did my own riff on a recipe found in a magazine for cinnamon muffins, doubling the cinnamon and adding espresso powder (thank you 'Winger for inadvertently mentioning espresso powder at exactly the right moment). I'm not a big sweets fan but I absolutely LOVED this because it wasn't that sweet, and everybody else (including the sweet tooths) loved it too. Great recipe for fans of the potent Vietnamese cinnamon, though of course any cinnamon will do.

Makes 12 regular (cup cake) sized muffins, 6 large, or an 8" square cake.

For the cake part:

2 cups AP flour
1 cup sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
3 teaspoons espresso powder
2 eggs
2/3 c milk
1/2 cup butter, melted

In a small bowl, combine the dry ingredients. Whisk the egg, milk and butter together; then stir into the dry ingredients until just moistened. Fill greased muffin tins 2/3 full, or use greased 8" cake pan. Sprinkle over topping, below, and bake at 400 F for 15-18 minutes, or closer to 25 minutes if making a cake.

For the topping:

8 tsp AP flour
4 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
4 tsp cold butter

Cut butter into dry ingredient mixture until it resembles coarse crumbs. Sprinkle over battter and bake.

[Karen/NoCA]

I love your pineapple muffins and add cinnamon to them as well. Plus, the Vietnamese cinnamon is what I have right now. Will be making this for the weekend. Thanks for sharing.

[Redwinger]

Looks good. Showed it to Norma and she will try it very soon. How bad can it be. it has Espresso Powder and Vietnamese Cinnamon in it.
Thanks for posting.

[Jo Ann Henderson]

Hey, Jenise
Are the measurements correct for the streusel topping? I've never seen a recipe that called for teaspoons of butter. Also, 4 tsps doesn't seem to be enough to sufficiently cut into 12 tsps of combined flour and sugar. Just wondering.

[Drew Hall]

Thanks Jenise, I'll make the recipe this weekend although for a moment I thought, "where am I gonna find AP flour?"...then I realized and said "you idiot..it's ALL PURPOSE FLOUR!!!

[Jenise]

Hey, Jenise
Are the measurements correct for the streusel topping? I've never seen a recipe that called for teaspoons of butter. Also, 4 tsps doesn't seem to be enough to sufficiently cut into 12 tsps of combined flour and sugar. Just wondering.

Yes, 4+4+2, in teaspoons, was the original recipe for flour, sugar and butter respectively--I just double-checked, and it turned out well for me. But that recipe was for six measly muffins where I had turned it into coffee cake (literally!) so just doubled the base parts.

[Redwinger]

Fresh from the oven and smells wonderful FWIW, the cake took 23 minutes in our oven.

Espresso Coffee Cake.JPG (123.49 KiB) Viewed 410 times

[Jenise]

'Winger, do you like raw batter? Bob declared that the best he'd ever sampled. Of course, deprivation would have a lot to do with that since I almost never bake cakes. You're much more fortunate!

[Mike Filigenzi]

Wow - I may see if my wife will make up a batch of that. Sounds fantastic and looks great.

[Redwinger]

'Winger, do you like raw batter? Bob declared that the best he'd ever sampled. Of course, deprivation would have a lot to do with that since I almost never bake cakes. You're much more fortunate!

Jenise, I don't know how the raw batter tastes. I was told to get my a$$ out of the kitchen. Since I was craving some coffee cake, for once I did as I was told.

[Jenise]

Wow - I may see if my wife will make up a batch of that. Sounds fantastic and looks great.

Your predicament is what prompted me to post that, Mike, since you can have baked goods but coffee intake is apparently limited to below what you'd prefer. Thought this might be a two-fer!

[Karen/NoCA]

Jenise, I just made up a batch of the muffins and they made 14 muffins and with plenty of topping. They sure smell good in the oven right now and have actually risen out of the muffin tin by quite a bit. I always add an extra egg to my muffin mixes.