This Sour Cream Crumb Cake is the perfect crumb cake! A light and buttery sponge is layered with delicious brown sugar streusel crumbs and topped off with even more hunks of streusel. Great for breakfast or a cakey treat with a cup of afternoon coffee, you won’t be able to help yourself!
I have a love hate relationship with breakfast. On one hand, it’s my absolute favourite meal of the day and one of my favourite foods to prepare. Give me a lazy Sunday morning, my records and unlimited cups of tea and I’ll whip up a feast fit for a king. On the other hand, come Monday morning I turn into an angry faced zombie person slamming around the cupboards looking for a rogue Jammy Dodger. I’m even worse since I gave up caffeine, uh oh!
Imagine my elation when I discovered Crumb Cake! A cake made for breakfast! It was literally designed to be enjoyed with a cup of coffee(or tea). Obviously I had to have a go for myself and after many, many attempts this sour cream crumb cake was born. The best of all my experiments, this crumb cake is special. Not only is the top of the cake jam packed with chunks of brown sugar streusel but I even layered some throughout the cake itself.
What is Crumb Cake?
Crumb Cake, often referred to as New York Crumb Cake is a moist and buttery vanilla cake topped with a heavy layer of streusel crumbs made from brown sugar, flour, sugar and heaps of cinnamon. It’s closely related to coffee cake, which funnily enough does not contain coffee, weird huh! The main difference between the two is the crumb layer. New York Crumb Cake has a thicker, denser layer of crumbs whereas a coffee cake has a much lighter distribution of topping. Both are delicious but I’m firmly in the more crumbs camp! Gimme all the cinnamon please.
Tips for the perfect crumb topping
- Use a fork to mix the crumbs, it’ll give you the chunkiest crumbles.
- Do not over mix the crumb topping, once the large crumbs form, stop. You don’t want a paste, paste is bad.
- When you add the crumbs to the top of your cake batter, give them a little press down so they’re firmly stuck to the cake. You don’t want those suckers falling off now, do you!
- More is more when it comes to cinnamon here, I could literally add half a jar and still be happy. If you’re not as keen on cinnamon as me, you can go a bit lighter but let’s be real. Everyone loves cinnamon!
Sour Cream Crumb Cake
- Total Time: 1 hour 15 minutes
- Yield: 16 squares 1x
Ingredients
For the Crumb Layers:
- 200g light brown sugar
- 100g caster sugar
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 tablespoons ground cinnamon
- 200g unsalted butter, melted
- 250g flour
For the Cake:
- 300g plain flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon bicarb soda
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 225g caster sugar
- 175g butter, at room temperature
- 375g sour cream, divided
- 4 large eggs
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Glace Icing:
- 150g icing sugar
- 1tbsp warm water
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 175C and grease and line a 9×9″ cake tin with baking parchment.
- For the Crumb Layer: In a large mixing bowl mix the sugars, salt and cinnamon together. Pour over the melted butter and give it a quick mix. Add the flour and mix until combined. There should be big and little lumps, that’s exactly the texture you’re looking for.
- For the Cake: In a large mixing bowl stir together the flour, baking powder and soda, and the salt. set aside. In another large bowl, whisk together the eggs, 200g of the sour cream, and vanilla extract. Beat well until the everything is well blended.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment mix the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, around 3-5 minutes. Add the remaining 125g of sour cream to the butter and mix.
- Add 1/3 of the flour mixture to the mixing bowl and mix until just combined followed by 1/3 of the egg mixture, mixing again until combined. Repeat two more times with the remaining flour and eggs. This is your crumb cake batter.
- Pour 1/3 of the batter into the base of your prepared cake tin and spread evenly, sprinkle over 1/3 of your crumbs over the batter and repeat two more times with the remaining batter and crumbs, making sure to spread everything evenly between additions.
- Bake for 50-55 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Allow to cool in the tin for 20 minutes.
- Remove the cake from the tin and place on a wire rack to cool while you make the glace icing.
- For the Icing: Sift the icing sugar into a bowl and slowly add the warm water, little at a time, until the icing becomes thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. You may need to add a little more icing sugar or water to get the desired consistency.
- Drizzle the icing over the crumb cake and cut into 16 squares. Enjoy!
Notes
This cake keeps in an airtight tin for up to 4 days.
- Prep Time: 20 minutes
- Cook Time: 55 minutes
- Category: Cake
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American