Taste & Create XIV: Starbucks Classic Coffee Cake

This month, I ended up with two partners for Taste & Create, the fabulous monthly food blog event hosted by the lovely Nicole from For the Love of Food. You probably already know that Nicole is on vacation this month, and I am the lucky guest host of the event! I'm very excited, it is an honor. Thanks again, Nicole, for the opportunity to help!

So my second partner is Stephanie from CIA - Cooking In an Apron. Stephanie has so many wonderful recipes, it was very hard to choose just one. I will definitely be making the Strawberry Colada Cookies with Toasted Coconut Cream Cheese Frosting, and probably the Mojito Pound Cake, ooh! and the Cream Cheese Shortbread Cookies with Pistachios as well. Do you see what I mean about a hard choice?! That is just the beginning of my To Bake list from Stephanie's blog. I definitely have to space these sweet treats out, lest I eat them ALL by myself!!

I finally decided on Stephanie's Starbucks Classic Coffee Cake, for several reasons. One, the nearest Starbucks is over an hour away, and it's embedded in a grocery store so I'm not even convinced that actually counts. Two, I've never had Starbucks coffee cake, but I am also tempted by baked goods in a display case. (I don't recall even seeing a display case in the grocery store-embedded Starbucks!) And three, it sounds amazingly delicious, and if Stephanie says it is her "all-time favorite," well I just had to try it!

I did double the pecans in the topping. We love pecans, and I have no prior expectations for this coffee cake, not having tried the original...

This coffee cake indeed tastes like a classic, excellent! Everyone loved it. I will definitely be making this one again.


Starbucks Classic Coffee Cake
Serves 8


-Topping-
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup light brown sugar, packed
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup chopped pecans (I doubled the pecans)

-Cake-
1 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup milk

Preheat oven 325 degrees F. Butter and flour into 9 x 13 pan, set aside.

Make topping by combining flour with brown sugar, butter and cinnamon in medium bowl. Mixture should have consistency of moist sand. Add pecans.

In a medium bowl combine flour, baking powder and salt. In separate large bowl, cream butter, brown sugar, sugar with mixer until smooth and fluffy. Add eggs, vanilla and mix well. Add dry mixture to moist ingredients, a little at a time. Add milk and mix well. Spoon batter into pan. Sprinkle crumb topping over batter, be sure topping completely covers batter.

Bake cake for 50 minutes or until edges begin to turn light brown. Cool and slice.