West Cork Coffee Cake
Coffee Cake, Kilcoe Style.
Well so much for yet another New Year’s resolution. Sugar and butter producers worldwide are breathing a sigh of relief as February dawns and all us poor eejits fall off the wagon. The health kick wagon that is. Bring on the cake I say. So in my rush to get you all to join me in my road to perdition, here is a slight repeat, in fact a total cog of the Chocolate Cake in my first blog. But this dear reader is the sticky edged coffee version. I am not going to make you trawl back through the blogs to find said choccy recipe so I’ll re-write the basics and changes here in full. This one calls for two 9” cake tins or two loaf tins as the cake, in my opinion, requires two types of icing. And two smaller cakes are perfect for a yummy layer in the middle.
What You Need:
• 230g/8oz butter at room temperature.
• 500g/18oz brown/Demerara sugar.
• 3 eggs.
• 310g/12oz of white spelt flour (you can use regular white flour)
• 2 teaspoons of baking soda/bread soda.
• half a teaspoon of salt.
• 120ml/4fl oz buttermilk (if you haven’t got any add 2 tspns of vinegar or lemon juice to regular milk and leave for 5 minutes)
• 240ml/8 fl oz hot strong coffee
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract (please do not use the fake one, it will make the cake taste shop-bought)
Icing(s)
For the Icing
Make up an easy coffee icing by adding hot extra-strong coffee to sieved icing sugar. Add it a tablespoon of coffee at a time to about 4oz of icing sugar, mixing as you go until it is oozing/runny. This will do for the top.
For the middle layer, go all out and add 2oz of butter to the above mixture. Not the actual above mixture, duh! Repeat the mixture, slightly less wet, and then add the butter.
For the cake: What You Do:
Cream the butter and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer, or by hand if this time you remembered to have it at room temperature. With the mixer on a slow speed add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. If at this point the whole thing looks like curdled mush, fear not, it will be just fine. Dense and moist is what we are looking for. No offense to the light fluffy cake brigade.
Combine, using a sieve, the flour, bread soda and salt in a medium bowl (That’s a bowl that will actually hold the volume, nothing fancier) Now add the flour mixture and the buttermilk to the wet mixture alternating both. Blend gently and then add in the hot coffee slowly and the vanilla. This will be a very wet mixture. Don’t over-mix, but do scrape the bottom of the bowl with a spatula before the next step as mentioned before in the chocolate cake recipe. And if you didn’t heed my first warning and you now have a new phone, tough!
Pour the batter into your prepared tins and bake in your pre-heated oven until a toothpick comes out clean. Again, if you don’t have a toothpick or a skewer use something thin and sharp. This can be anywhere from 30-40 minutes depending on your tin size and oven. Open the oven at twenty minutes and gently turn the cake 180 degrees. After 30 minutes check again and if still gooey close the door gently and check again every five to seven minutes. The beauty of this cake is, that it is better if it sinks. Dense, moist, delicious and you get sticky edges to boot.
Now, if you are using 2 x 9” cake tins turn the first cake out and spread the butter icing on it. Then top with the second cake and spread the plain icing on top letting some run down the sides. Decorate with chocolate coffee beans for special occasions.
If however you are using two loaf tins, be sensible. Did you really think we would be putting those on top of each other? A rectangular Leaning Tower of Pisa springs to mind. Nope. The beauty of this shape is you get two cakes. Bonus. Split horizontally (that’s the lying down equator direction) and follow instructions above for icing.
I have to admit here that this is my most favourite cake in the world. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do and that it is worth falling off the aforementioned wagon for.
hi dear sharon, i am in vienna and got a request for a holiday home. so i looked up your website and gave the recommendation. and i just discovered your blog with your mouth watering recipes!!! thanks! see you soon, season is starting 😉 cheers, eliane