The first time I heard about crumb cake, I thought I must be dreaming.
I think we’d all have to agree that the best part of coffee cake is the crumble on top—so imagine a version minus the cinnamon ribbon in the middle plus EXTRA CRUMB ON TOP?! A dream.
In my over-enthusiastic crumb cake bake off journey, I decided that though the typical recipe yields were 8x8 pans (with a sprinkling of 9x13s), my tasters warranted full 9x13 batches.
Doubling some of the recipes meant I ended up with 8 lbs of butter in my fridge, all waiting to be consumed in a single day. (Yes, that is by far the most butter I’ve ever used in a bake off.) After being ill with food poisoning/mystery virus for days beforehand, all that butter was the LAST thing I wanted in my presence…but we made it through.
Let’s get to the results!
Crumb Cake Bake Off Results
Thanks to everyone who voted in the survey last month! With your input, I’ll be keeping the early results sneak peek consolidated in these emails with the full bake off post going out to everyone next week.
A reminder that even though rankings require that some cakes fall into “last place," each cake is perfect to someone and in its own right! Your ideal crumb cake greatly depends on your personal preferences.
While I loved the texture of most of these cakes, my main critique was often around the lack of flavor. So often, yellow cakes can be stodgy, dry or a little dull tasting. While all of these cakes were rich in butter and sugar, it takes a special balance of tang and salt to achieve a flavorful cake, which is especially key in such a simple cake.
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