My husband loves a good piece of cake with his coffee for breakfast. His breakfast-of-choice for many years, pretty much every morning. That was before we married and my heckling him about eating a healthier breakfast like oatmeal or avocado on toast. Not much fun, but I do want to keep him around a long time.
So, as much as I don’t encourage this type of “breakfast” it is Father’s Day weekend so let’s make Dad some kick-ass sweet cornmeal cake studded with fresh blueberries and a crumb-cake-like topping to go with his coffee, for old times sake.
Just to get a little personal here: caring for our twin boys with special needs is not easy. There are supplements to give, therapies to schedule around his work schedule, blood tests to take them to, school stuff to help them with, teaching them to ride a bike (so proud), to swim (proud of this too), and other generalized skills (lots of them with steady progress). Phew, it’s a handful and I couldn’t do it alone. Fortunately, hubby of mine is dedicated to giving his all to his family. All that stuff I mentioned includes being a Dad to our older ones (including a teenager!), which makes him a rock star.
He’s gonna love this.
Actually anyone would love this. I mean, c’mon it has blueberries in every bite and is so moist and full of sweet buttery charm similar to a corn cake you would find down South.
I adapted the recipe to gluten, dairy, and soy free (and egg free for the muffins) from Deb Perelman’s the Smitten Kitchen Cookbook, the blogger behind Smitten Kitchen. I finally bought her cookbook (don’t know what took me so long) and knew, after flipping through the book, that this cake would remind my husband of the old days in New York that were filled with crumb cake to go with coffee in those blue and white paper coffee cups and plastic white lids (anyone remember those? do they still have those?). There weren’t any ripe summertime blueberries or sweet corn flavor swirled into that cake – like in here – for the added oomph Dad deserves.
And simple to enough to whip up … first some topping to chill.
Then beat the butter and sugar until nice and creamy, don’t rush this step it really makes a difference in the moistness and texture of cake …
Eggs, one at a time … I used banana in the muffins to keep it egg-free for my oldest son. 
And the coconut yogurt. Don’t beat it much, just until blended …
Batter will be thick and sticky, just the way we want it.
Gently fold in the blueberries to keep them whole …
Now let’s pile on the topping.
For the muffins: scoop with a mini ice cream scooper and sprinkle with topping.
Cake or muffins, or both.
I will admit this cake and coffee thing is good. REAL GOOD.
And since my house is full of boys (who love a crumb-style muffin AND blueberries) I doubled the recipe and made muffins too, some to freeze for later (camp snacks for the twins next week!) and some to gobble up over the weekend because I don’t think my husband is going to share any from the pan for him.
I wouldn’t either.
Lucky for me I get first dibs … ha!
Coffee and scrumptious blueberry cornmeal cake (and muffins) for breakfast – Thanks, Deb!
Happy Father’s Day to all the Dad’s out there!
- For the cake:
- ¾ stick of Earth Balance soy free stick or 6 tablespoons, at room temperature, plus more for greasing the pan
- ⅓ cup white rice flour, plus extra for flouring the pan
- ¼ cup brown rice flour
- ⅓ cup sorghum flour
- ½ cup cornmeal
- 2 teaspoons aluminum free baking powder
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- ¾ cup raw or cane sugar
- 3 large eggs (or 1½ ripe bananas which I used for the muffins to make this egg free)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla paste or pure extract
- ½ teaspoon lemon extract
- 1 teaspoon lemon zest
- ⅓ cup plain coconut yogurt
- 2 cups fresh blueberries, rinsed and patted dry
- For the topping:
- 5 tablespoons white rice flour
- 2 tablespoons cornmeal
- ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
- 2 tablespoons non-dairy soy free spread)
- ⅓ cup raw sugar
- Preparation:
- Preheat the oven temperature to 350 degrees F. Grease sides and bottom of an 8 -inch square pan with earth balance and flour (white rice flour), shake out excess flour or line 2 cupcake sized (muffin size is too big) pans with cupcake liners.
- For the topping:
- Combine all the ingredients and chill (as Deb recommends: mash with a fork or your fingers).
- For the cake:
- Whisk the flours, cornmeal, baking powder, and kosher salt, then transfer about a ¼ cup of the flour blend into a separate bowl and combine with blueberries; combine well and set aside.
- Using a stand mixer set with a paddle attachment or an electric mixer set on medium speed, beat the earth balance spread and sugar until pale and creamy looking, about 3 minutes.
- Add the eggs, one at a time, OR bananas if choosing to make egg free muffins then turn off and scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl.
- Turn it back on and add the vanilla, lemon extract, and lemon zest.
- Then add half of the flour mixture, and half of the yogurt, beating until just blended before each addition. Repeat with remaining flour and yogurt then turn off and scrape
down the sides and bottom of the bowl. - Gently fold in blueberries (coated in
flour mixture) into the batter. The batter will appear thick and best spread with a rubber spatula. - Spread into greased pan OR scoop into cupcake liners about ¾ full.
- Sprinkle the topping on the cake or top each muffin with a heaping tablespoon.
- Bake the square cake pan 35-40 minutes OR 20-25 minutes for muffins.
- Cool the cake in the pan for 15 minutes before transferring onto a cooling rack (I hold the cooling rack directly over the cake pan and while holding both flip it over so it sits on the cooling rack.
- Slice and serve at room temperature.
- Do not slice while hot or it may crumble.
- Sliced cake (or muffins) freeze well in an airtight (freezer-safe) container with slices separated with parchment paper.
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