Blueberry Coffee Cake with Brown Butter Streusel
This Blueberry Coffee Cake with Streusel Topping is perfect for serving as dessert, a brunch treat, or as a treat to enjoy with your coffee. This Blueberry Coffee Cake recipe features an ultra moist, buttery cake that is speckled with fresh juicy blueberries, and topped with a deliciously crumbly brown butter streusel topping! This Blueberry Coffee Cake is a perfect recipe for using up your fresh summer blueberries, however feel free to use frozen berries as well.
What is Coffee Cake?
Coffee cake, simply put, is a cake that is meant to be eaten with coffee! The origins of this cake are unknown but it is believed that the cake, as we know it today, was brought over to North America by Dutch, German, and Scandinavian immigrants in the 1800’s. Coffee cakes are also known as crumb cakes, streusel cakes, or sometimes even buckles (if they have fruit). Essentially, coffee cakes are sweet cakes that are topped with a sweet crumb coating called streusel. The flavor combinations and varieties of coffee cakes are vast, ranging from simple cinnamon coffee cakes, to strawberry rhubarb coffee cake, to Bailey’s Hot Chocolate Coffee Cake.
FRESH VS FROZEN BLUEBERRIES
Being that it is summer and blueberries are now in season, it is the perfect time to take advantage of using fresh blueberries in your baking! However, that being said, at other times during the year it can be hard to find fresh blueberries, and sometimes you have to resort to using frozen. But if you’ve ever used frozen blueberries in a batter before, you may have noticed that your entire cake has turned blue or even green! Well, there is a simple solution to this – rinsing your frozen berries! Rinsing the blueberries will remove any of the excess juice that surrounds the berries, ensuring that that liquid isn’t around to seep into the rest of the batter and dye it. The rinse required is not a quick one though. When rinsing you need to keep rinsing until the water draining off of them is almost clear. But after this thorough rinse, the frozen blueberries should be good to use, and no different than fresh, making for a delicious and eye-pleasing coffee cake!
How to Prevent a Soggy Cake Bottom
If you’ve ever made any cake or baked good with blueberries you may have found that they are seem to sink to the bottom of the pan, causing a soggy, blueberry-laden cake bottom! There is a way to prevent this though! The secret to preventing this happens in 2 steps. First is to dust the blueberries with a layer of cornstarch. The second is to spoon a blueberry-free layer of cake batter into the bottom of the cake pan, then fold the blueberries into the rest of the batter, and pour over top of the blueberry free layer! These two steps ensure that the blueberries don’t sink down causing a messy bottom!
How to Make Blueberry Coffee Cake
To make this Blueberry Coffee Cake, start by creaming together the butter, sugar, and brown sugar in the stand mixer. You should beat these together until the mixture looks thick and fluffy. The purpose of this is to incorporate a bunch of air into the batter, which helps with the fluffy final texture. Next add in the eggs and vanilla, and beat for another minute of so. Meanwhile, in a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon. Throw this dry mixture into the stand mixer and beat until just combined and smooth. Next, beat in the sour cream until just combined. Then spoon a small layer of batter onto the bottom of a prepared cake pan, then fold in the cornstarch dusted blueberries into the rest of the batter, then pour the Blueberry Coffee Cake batter over top of the previous layer, top with streusel, and bake!
How to Make Streusel Topping
Making the streusel for this Blueberry Coffee Cake involves the use of brown butter. To make the brown butter, start by adding the unsalted, cubed, room temperature butter to a small sauce pan over medium heat. Then essentially boil the butter and continue to boil, stirring constantly to promote even cooking, until the color is a beautiful nutty brown and ultra-fragrant. Let this brown butter cool slightly for 10 minutes or so, then pour the brown butter into a bowl that has sugar, flour, and salt, that has been whisked together. Now simply use a fork to mix it all together until uniform little crumbs have formed.
Get the Recipe: Blueberry Coffee Cake with Brown Butter Streusel
Ingredients
Blueberry Coffee Cake
- 240 g All Purpose Flour
- 1 ½ tsp Baking Powder
- 1/2 tsp Salt
- 1/2 tsp Cinnamon
- 1/2 cup Unsalted Butter,, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup White Sugar
- 1/2 cup Dark Brown Sugar
- 2 Large Eggs
- 2 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 3/4 cup Full-Fat Sour Cream
- 1 ½ cups Fresh Blueberries,, if using frozen see above
- 2 tbsp Corn Starch,, for dusting blueberries
Brown Butter Streusel Topping
- 5 tbsp Unsalted Butter,, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup White Sugar
- 3/4 cup All Purpose Flour
- Pinch of Salt
Equipment
- Stand mixer
Instructions
Blueberry Coffee Cake
- Preheat oven to 350°F. Prepare an 8” pan with oil and parchment paper. In a medium sized bowl, add blueberries and lightly toss with cornstarch, then dust off any excess cornstarch.
- In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, add butter, white sugar and brown sugar. Beat on medium-high until light and fluffy looking, about 3-4 minutes. Add in the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition and scraping the sides of the bowl.
- In a separate medium sized bowl, add the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt. Whisk together to combine.
- Add 1/3 of the flour mixture to the stand mixer, mix on low until combined. Add ½ of the sour cream and mix on low until combined. Continue alternating the flour and the sour cream, until both have been completely added (finishing with the flour mixture). Add the vanilla and mix until combined. Fold in the blueberries
- Pour the batter into the pan and spread smooth. Sprinkle the top with the streusel, then place into the oven and bake for 35-40 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean.
Brown Butter Streusel
- In a small sauce over medium heat, add butter and bring to a boil. Continue heating over medium heat, constantly stirring until the butter has turned a nutty brown color. It may be hard to see the color if your butter is foaming a lot, so periodically take it off the heat to check the color. Once browned remove from heat and allow to sit for 10 minutes to cool slightly.
- Meanwhile, in a medium mixing bowl, add sugar, flour, and salt. Whisk to combine well.
- Pour the brown butter into the dry mixture and mix with a fork until well combined, and the mixture resembles sand.
Related Recipes
Looking for more cake recipes? Check out these below:
VANILLA CARDAMOM BUNDT CAKE W/ VANILLA BEAN GLAZE. This bundt cake is bursting with flavor thanks to the addition of cardamom, orange zest, and vanilla.
ULTRA MOIST CARROT CAKE WITH CREAM CHEESE FROSTING. Everything you’ve ever wanted in a carrot cake! Moist, flavorful, and of course topped with a cream cheese frosting – this cake is the definition of heaven!
PISTACHIO CAKE WITH HONEY ROSEWATER BUTTERCREAM. This cake combines the flavors of pistachios and rose water to create a cake that is luxuriously moist, deeply flavored, and satisfyingly aromatic
These flavors sound delicious! Nothing better than brown butter 🙂
I agree! Brown Butter makes everything better!