I think that this is the first time I’ve ever tried baking a cake with a crumble topping; which presented an interesting challenge; how to get the cake out of the tin? I decided that the best method might be to cut it into four and then use a fish slice to carefully extract each large piece. So here you see me at one down, three to go.
Cinammon and blueberries; what’s not to like? My new Wilton baking tray (with the size helpfully embossed in the handles so you don’t need to pull out your measuring tape to check you’ve got the right size for each recipe) came with this very tempting sounding recipe for a cake with a mouth-watering medley of blueberries, cinnamon, pecans and the cassonade sugar I used for the lemon drizzle cake.
Even better still the cake was beautifully easy to make, although it did feel like I’d used half the kitchen equipment and I had bowls and measuring jugs scattered across the counter. The sponge mixture was enriched by a half a cup of sour cream, something which I always think of as very north American and which keeps the cake really moist. And when the cake came out of the oven the top had a great crunch to it, where the cassonade mixture had formed a crust. The only thing I wondered as I munched through a testing slice was whether the flavour from the fresh blueberries was too subtle – would blueberry jam have worked better? However I took some round as a gift to a friend who invited me to lunch and there were no complaints so it can’t have been all bad. Still I might have to try another slice just to check ………
The ingredients with the cassonade, sour cream and useful butter stick.
It’s not here but I did remember the baking powder this time.
Making the cassonade mixture; cassonade, cinnamon and pecan pieces.
You make the cake by layering; first a layer of sponge, then cassonade mixture with blueberries….
…then another layer of sponge and topped off by cassonade mixture.
Blueberry brunch bar or Cassonade cake recipe
½ cup softened unsalted butter
¾ cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
¼ tsp bicarbonate of soda
¼ tsp salt
½ cup sour cream
½ light brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1 cup chopped pecans
1 cup blueberries
Preheat the oven to 180oC. Grease an 8 inch square baking tray. Cream butter and granulated sugar in a large bowl until light and fluffy and then add eggs and vanilla. Toss flour, baking powder, bicarb and salt with a fork in another bowl and then add alternately with sour cream to creamed mixture. Mix until smooth. In another bowl mix brown sugar, cinnamon and nuts together.
Pour half the batter into the tray. Mix the blueberries with half of the cassonade mixture and spread over the mixture, before adding the remaining cake mixture. Finish off with the other half of the cassonade mixture. Bake for 35-40 minutes or until a knife comes out clean.
Makes 8 generous slices.
Note on the recipe; I’m afraid that I haven’t done the cups to metric or imperial weights conversion but have left the plain flour with added raising agents, though I’m sure it would work equally well with self-raising flour.
maplesyrupandcastersugar 