Blueberry Cream Cheese Coffee Cake

I was living up to my blog’s title, “a Pastry Chef wanna be” this past week. I found a hard to resist recipe, despite the fact that it seemed complicated, Blueberry Cream Cheese Coffee Cake.  I mean, look at the picture on that website.  Don’t you agree that it really looks delicious?  The picture makes you want to make it, even if you have to go ten miles to get the ingredients. No, I did not go anywhere for ten miles… 😛  Plus, it is a berry season, and I got quite cheap berries from my Sam’s Club.   So I had no reason not to make this cake, right?

I baked this cake Monday, on Memorial Day, so I can bring the leftovers to the office.  It was safer that way, so we would not eat the whole cake by ourselves.   If we did, we might be rolling down our driveway instead of walking this morning.

So, you would need all these ingredients.  The brown looking liquid in a bottle by the corn starch is apple juice.  If you don’t have plain yogurt, I read from the reviews you can use sour cream instead.

First step was to butter up your spring-form pan.   You can also line up the bottom of the pan with parchment paper, and butter up the parchment paper itself too.  A spring-form pan is a genius product.  You can bake a cake, and take it out of the pan without flipping the cake out and messing up the top!

Second step was to wash the berries, and put them into a small/medium sauce pan.   Oh, I used more berries than what the recipe requested.   I like berries, so I like them a lot and I would eat a lot of them if I can.

Then I put the 1/4 cup of apple juice into the sauce pan.

Bring them to a boil.

While the berries and the apple juice were simmering for three minutes, get a small bowl and measure up your corn starch and add water.

Stir it until the corn starch is incorporated.

Then pour it into the blueberry mixture to thicken.

Stir it and turn off the fire, and let it cool to a room temperature.

Then get a mixing bowl, and put the flour in it.

Add the sugar into it, and whisk it to combine them.

Then add in the chilled, cut up butter into the bowl.

Use your pastry cutter to cut them until it resembled to coarse mixture. Now if you have a food processor, go ahead and use that instead of the pastry cutter.

Reserve half a cup of the crumbs and set them aside.

Add in the baking soda, baking powder, salt and lemon peel.

Stir and mix until they are incorporated.

Then, in another bowl, mix the yogurt, vanilla, and one egg.

Stir this until they are blended.

Then pour the wet mixture into the dry mixture.

Stir until they’re incorporated.  I just could not believe my nose when I was stirring this.  It smelled sweet, lemony, and buttery; I told my self, “Oh no, I’m in trouble.”   I have a tendency to like stuff like shortbread, where it is very buttery, and not too sweet.   The smell of the mixture reminded me of shortbread.

When you finish mixing it, then dump the batter into the spring-form pan.  The batter was very thick, so you will most likely have to scoop it out rather than pouring it into the pan.

Then use your spatula to spread the butter into the rest of the spring-form pan.  I tried to make the edges a little higher than the center because we are going to pour the cream cheese mixture and the blueberry mixture, and leaving some edge of the batter uncovered.

At this point, I started heating up my oven to 350F.  Mine only takes about 10-12 minutes to heat up to 350F. If yours take longer, then heat it up earlier.   Then, in the same bowl I used for the butter (you don’t need to wash it), I put in the other egg, sugar and cream cheese.  The recipe called for a six ounce package of cream cheese, but I did not have any other use for 2 ounces of cream cheese, so I went ahead and used the whole thing.  I did not adjust anything else.

Beat this with a mixer until smooth, probably about 3-5 minutes.

Then in the bowl where you reserve your crumb mixture, drop in the sliced almonds.

Mix them up with your fingers, or forks.

Then you are ready to pour the cream cheese mixture into the pan.

Make sure you leave out about 1/2 inch edges uncovered with the cream cheese mixture.

Then take your sauce pan and pour the blueberry mixture on top of the cream cheese mixture.

Spread it out, and you can leave out some cream cheese mixture uncovered.  If there are juices that oozes out, that is fine.  I think it just adds character to the cake.

Then the last step is to sprinkle the reserved crumbs with sliced almonds.

That is it! Then bake it for about 40-45 minutes. Mine takes longer because of the added cream cheese mixture.

I just had to peek into the oven. The batter has risen a little bit.

When it’s done, that is when the center barely jiggles when you shake the pan gently. Take it out of the oven and let it cool for 15 minutes.

Look at the ooey goey blueberries mixture…

After 15 minutes, take off the outer edge of the pan, and let the cake continue to cool off.

Who can resist this cake??

I even urged my hubby to cook dinner faster so we can have the dessert! Look at this slice of the coffee cake. The edges of the cake browned perfectly. The crumbly and crunchy almond crumbs, combined with the tartness of blueberry mixture on top, the sweeten, soft and smooth cream cheese in the middle, along with the a hint of sweetness and lemony in the moist cake was just perfect for my taste buds.

This is just a different angle of the cake… You get to see the crumbs mixture… 🙂

I really like this cake…

Luckily we could control ourself and did not finish the whole cake ourselves. Lucky office people I guess! 🙂  Do you want to move closer to me?

Print recipe here.

Blueberry Cream Cheese Coffee Cake

Ingredients

1 cup fresh/frozen blueberries
1/4 cup apple juice
1 teaspoon cornstarch
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup (1/4 lb.) cold butter, cut into chunks
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon grated lemon peel
3/4 cup plain low-fat yogurt
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 large eggs
8 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1/2 cup sliced almonds

Preparation

1. In a 1- to 2-quart pan over medium heat, bring blueberries and apple juice to a boil. Lower heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, until blueberries have released their juices, about 3 minutes.  In a small bowl, blend cornstarch and 2 teaspoons water.  Add to  blueberry mixture; stir until it simmers and thickens, about 1 minute.  Let cool to room temperature.
2. In a bowl or food processor, mix or whirl flour and 3/4 cup sugar.  Add butter to flour mixture.  Cut in with a pastry blender or pulse until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Reserve 1/2 cup; pour remaining into a large bowl.  Stir in baking powder, baking soda, salt, and lemon peel.
3. In a bowl, mix yogurt, vanilla, and 1 egg until blended; stir into flour-baking powder mixture until incorporated.  Spread batter in a buttered 9-inch round cake pan with a removable rim.
4. In a bowl or food processor (no need to wash from step 2), beat with an electric mixer on
high speed or whirl cream cheese, remaining 1/4 cup sugar, remaining egg, and lemon juice
until smooth.  Spread over batter in pan, leaving a 1/2-inch border bare. Gently spread blueberry mixture over cream cheese mixture, leaving some visible.  Stir almonds into reserved flour mixture and sprinkle over cake, concentrating most around edge of batter.
5. Bake in a 350° oven until center of cake barely jiggles when pan is gently shaken and top of cake is golden brown, 30 to 40 minutes.  Let cool on a rack for 15 minutes, then remove pan rim.  Serve warm or at room temperature.