Our September Cake of the Month is coffee cake in pound cake form, drizzled with cream cheese icing. A slice of Cinnamon Nut is perfect for a breakfast meeting, a Sunday school treat, or for the teachers’ lounge. Even if you give away this cake as a gift, the extra batter will make 4 muffins for you to keep for yourself. You’ll be begging to start your day with a slice of this cake and a steaming cup of coffee!
Ingredients
Cake
- Floured baking spray
- 1 ½ cups sour cream
- 1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
- 6 large eggs, at room temperature
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 3 c cake flour
- 3 c granulated sugar
- 1 ½ cups unsalted butter, at room temperature
Streusel
- 1 c pecans, chopped
- ¼ cup dark brown sugar, packed
- 1 tbsp. ground cinnamon
- ⅓ cup cake flour
- ¼ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Icing
- ¼ stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 4 oz cream cheese, at room temperature
- ¾ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- ½ pound confectioners’ sugar
Instructions
- Cream the butter and sugar in a large bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment on medium speed for 20 minutes, until light and fluffy.
- Preheat the oven to 325°F.
Cake
- While the butter and sugar are creaming, measure out the remaining ingredients for the pound cake and streusel.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together the cake flour and salt and set aside.
- Mix the streusel ingredients in a separate bowl and set aside.
- Once the butter and sugar have finished creaming, scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl.
- With the mixer on low speed, add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.
- Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl again.
- Add the vanilla extract and let the mixture beat on low speed for 5 minutes.
- With the mixer still on low speed, alternately add the flour mixture and sour cream, beginning with the flour mixture and ending with the sour cream. Mix until well blended.
- Add ⅔ cup of streusel to the batter and mix on low speed until well blended.
- Scrape the sides of the bowl and incorporate any unmixed batter if necessary.
- Fold in the remaining streusel by hand.
- Prepare a large 12-cup Bundt pan with floured baking spray.
- Pour the batter into the prepared Bundt pan until it is about 1 to 1½ inches from the top. Tap the pan on the counter to ensure there are no air bubbles. (Use the remaining batter to make muffins. This should fill about 4 muffin cups.)
- Bake for 1 hour and 20 minutes. Insert a wooden skewer into the cake, and if there is no cake on the skewer, it is done.
- Remove the cake from the oven. Allow the cake to cool in the pan, on a wire rack, for 15 minutes or until cool enough to handle with pot holders. Place the wire rack on top of the cake pan and flip the pan over. Gently lift the pan, being careful not to remove any of the outside crust.
- Place the cake in the refrigerator to chill. While the cake is in the refrigerator, prepare the icing.
Icing
- Cream the butter and cream cheese in the bowl of a stand mixer for 3 minutes. At the end of the 3 minutes, scrape the bowl extremely well.
- Add the vanilla extract and beat for 1 to 2 minutes.
- Slowly add the confectioners’ sugar, about 1 cup at a time, beating on low to ensure the sugar does not fly out of the mixer.
- After each addition of confectioners’ sugar, scrape the bottom of the bowl extremely well.
- Once all the confectioners’ sugar is incorporated, beat on low speed for 3 minutes.
- To ice the pound cake, heat the cream cheese icing in the microwave for about 45 seconds or until it is slightly warm.
- Drizzle the warm icing over the top of the chilled cake. The cake should not be completely covered with icing. Once the cake is iced, place in the refrigerator until the icing is hardened.