Remember when I went MIA last month? This is what I was doing. Making crumb cake after crumb cake, giving them away, picking them apart—I am patting myself on the back for only having to deposit two directly into the garbage.
I mean, how difficult could crumb cake be to make, you know? People have been making it forever. Slightly dense, buttery cake topped with a crunchy cinnamon crumb simply could not be that much of a challenge…right?
Wrong. So wrong. Seventeen dud crumb cakes wrong. I mean, they all tasted right (well, all but two), but they sunk in the center, too. Every single one. It didn’t matter what I did—adding eggs, changing the amounts of flour and sour cream, reducing the amount of crumb (heaven forbid!)—I could not get them to come out even.
But then. But. Then. I remembered that while baking powder helps cakes to puff, too much can cause them to collapse. I barely reduced the baking powder in my up-to-then best recipe and, well, here we are. Slightly dense, buttery cake topped with a crunchy cinnamon crumb, just like people have been making forever.
Sour Cream Crumb Cake
makes 1 8-inch pan, about 12 servings
Crumb:
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup light brown sugar, packed
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 Kosher or sea salt
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
Cake Batter:
1 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon Kosher or sea salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg, room temperature
1/4 cup full-fat sour cream
1 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 tablespoons milk of choice
For Garnish (optional):
confectioner’s sugar
Preheat oven to 350F. Grease an 8-inch square pan. Line with parchment, leaving overhang on two sides, then grease again. Set aside.
Make the crumb. In a small mixing bowl, use a fork to whisk together flour, light brown sugar, cinnamon, and salt. Add melted butter and stir together until everything is moistened and clumps form. Set aside.
Make the cake batter. In a small-medium mixing bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
In a large mixing bowl, use an electric mixer to cream butter until very light and fluffy (about 2 minutes). Beat in granulated sugar. Mix in egg, followed by sour cream. Add vanilla and milk. With the mixer on low, mix in dry ingredients in two installments. Batter will be thick.
Spread batter into the prepared pan. Scatter crumb evenly over the top and lightly press them into the batter. Bake 45-50 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Let cake cool completely in the pan on a rack.
Run a small, thin knife along the edges of the pan, then use the parchment overhang to lift the cake onto a cutting board. Dust with confectioners sugar, if desired. Slice into 12 pieces.
Serve cake room temperature or slightly warm. Leftovers may be kept covered at room temperature for a few days or in the refrigerator for up to a week.
I had the idea for this Chocolate Chip Cookie Crumb Cake after making 
Generally speaking, I’m not a big celebrator of food holidays, but I seem to always remember 
I mean, look at that pillowy soft chocolate chip cake! It’s buttery, tight-crumbed, and super moist thanks to half a cup of sour cream. It’s almost enough to restore my hope for the future.
Oh, and speaking of restoring hope in things, let’s discuss the crispy chocolate chip cookie crumb topping! It’s the real star of this show. Think streusel, but instead of cinnamon there’s a bunch of brown sugar and chocolate chips in the mix—it’s actual perfection.
If you want perfectly clean slices and have slightly more patience than I do, you can wait til the cake has cooled completely before divvying it up. I ceased having extra patience 42 days ago, so the pictured slice is a little scraggly…but as a perk, the chocolate chips are still soft. I will choose melty chocolate over aesthetics any day, anytime. But, like, especially today and right now. The future can wait while I finish my slice of cake.
Happy Chocolate Chip Day, dear readers.
I’ll admit that my heart sank to my ankles when I was asked to make “something like” the Milk Bar Birthday Cake for a first birthday party a few weeks ago.
It’s not that I have anything against Christina Tosi or 
Long story short, I got it together, spent a lot of time looking at my copy of the 
I have little intention of making it again because who has that kind of time??? But I will make time for one element: the Funfetti crumb. It’s got all the buttery crunch you’d expect in a shortbread or crispy sugar cookie, but it’s as simple as making the crumb topping for a coffee cake. And it’s colorful and happy and just the tiniest bit salty. And, well, connect the (rainbow sprinkle) dots.
Double Funfetti Crumb Cake is exactly what it sounds like: tender sour cream Funfetti cake with a layer of Funfetti crumb baked on top. It’s the buttery, rainbow-speckled, no-cinnamon-allowed everyday coffee cake you didn’t know you wanted.
The cake is rich and dense, the crumb provides just the right amount of crisp-crunch, and the rainbow sprinkles (
What? We all know that person. We may not totally understand their tastes but we respect them, and now we can make extra-fun cake for them to show them how much we love them.
…this took a weird turn. Happy Friday, dear readers! Make yourself a cake this weekend!
e2 bakes brooklyn 