Traditional Coffee Cake

Here’s something to whip up this weekend.  As you may know, I am a major coffee lover, and that also goes for coffee cake.  This recipe is really quick and delicious.  And it will make your house smell oh-so-yummy!  This is a good thing to make for dessert, breakfast or brunch.  (If you don’t have whole wheat pastry flour, you can replace it with unbleached flour.)

Traditional Style Coffee Cake

For the cake:

• 1 cup soymilk or almond milk (or other non-dairy milk)
• 1/3 cup canola oil
• 1 Tbsp white distilled vinegar
• 1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
• 1/2 cup unbleached flour
• 1/2 cup raw sugar
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp ginger
• 1/4 tsp salt

For the crumble top:

• 3/4 cup unbleached flour
• 1/4 cup light brown sugar
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp ginger
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 3/4 cup chopped walnuts
• 5 Tbsp soy margarine (such as Earth Balance)
• (optional) jazz it up by adding 1 cup blueberries

Preheat oven to 350 F. Lightly spray a 8 or 9″ square pan with non-stick spray.

To make the cake: Mix the milk, oil, and vinegar in a small bowl and set aside.  In a large bowl, mix flours, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, and salt. (I usually stop here for a moment to assemble the crumble topping.)  Add the milk mixture to the flour mixture and stir until just combined. Add the berries, if using  (If you do decide to use the berries, throw them into a small dish with some extra flour and roll them around before adding to the mix.  The coating of flour will help the berries not sink to the bottom!) Pour into the baking dish.

To make the crumble topping: In a small bowl, combine the flour, sugar, cinnamon, ginger and salt.  Crumble in the butter with a fork or your hands until all mixed up & crumbly. Add in the nuts. Sprinkle the crumble topping evenly over the cake.

Bake 40 minutes, give or take 5 minutes, until a knife comes clean from the center.  Cool slightly and then DEVOUR!

I am really excited for this weekend.  It happens to be Memorial Day weekend, so there will surely be some fun in the sun and grilling out going on… but I am also attending a party at my sister’s house for my other sister to reveal the sex of her upcoming baby – I can’t wait for this because not only do I get to find out if I’m getting a nephew or neice, I get to see my entire family all together, which is a hard thing to do since that involves 20 or so people!  And I get to visit with my newest niece, Vera, who is just over a month old.

… and on top of all that, we have plans to go to the Renaissance Festival!  I LOVE the Renaissance Festival and I have to say, I’m really disappointed that I havent been in so long!   I must admit I’m a little curious about the food situation there.  I think most of the food will be meat-on-a stick kind of food, so I’m gonna pack a lunch & cross my fingers for extras.  They always have delicious sugar-coated almonds… I also remember them having barrels of big pickles (along with a crazy pickle-man who would occasionally throw a pickle!) Hahaha… oh the memories 🙂

Going to festivals is where one of the challenges enter of being vegan.  On occasions like this, I usually pack us up a really good lunch just to make sure the kids don’t go hungry. A lot of times, I will be surprised and find out something is actually vegan.  You can often find vegan snack foods readily, which are easy to fill up on, but they never feel satisfying and too much of them may even make you feel sick!  Better to be safe and pack a lunch.

There is also a Native American festival at the Gwinnett County Fairgrounds this weekend.  I wish I had time to go to that too!  My kids really enjoyed our last trip to a pow-wow, which was at Stone Mountain Park.