Pumpkin Streusel Coffee Cake

With time off school and leftover pumpkin in the freezer, I decided to whip up these bars last night. They are loaded with spices, topped with crumble, and have a brown sugar layer in the middle that kind of melts into the cake. They're warm, soft, thick, and cakey, and it took all the self-control in me not to inhale them when I pulled them out of the oven.
I hope you enjoy this fall-themed treat in January!

Pumpkin Streusel Coffee Cake
recipe from: The Baker Chick

For the Cake:
2 cups all-purpose flour
2¼ teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
¾ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon  nutmeg
¼ teaspoon  cloves
1¼ cups light brown sugar
4 large eggs
¾ cup vegetable oil
One 15-ounce can pumpkin puree ( roughly 2 cups)
½ cup  milk

For the Cinnamon Filling:
1 cup brown sugar, light or dark
1½ tablespoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon cocoa powder (optional)

For the Crumb Topping:
2 cups of flour
⅔ cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon
6 tablespoons butter, melted


Mix the ingredients for the cinnamon filling together in a bowl.

Use your hands or a fork to mix together the crumb topping ingredients until crumbly.

Preheat the oven to 350 F and prepare a 9 by 13 inch pan.

Whisk together all the dry ingredients except the sugar in a large bowl. In another bowl, beat together the brown sugar and the eggs until fluffy. Add the oil, the pumpkin puree, and the milk. Stir in the dry ingredients until just combined.

Pour half the batter into the pan and then sprinkle the cinnamon filling on top. Pour the rest of the cake batter on top and then top with the crumb topping. Bake for 30 to 50 minutes, or until it passes the toothpick test.

Rainbow swirl cake

My mum and I made this for my sister's birthday and used neon food coloring.

Rainbow cake:
Ingredients:
- any white cake recipe or use a box mix
- food coloring
 
Prepare your cake batter. Divide the batter into separate bowls and add food coloring to create the colors you'd like. Grease your cake pan(s) and line them with baking paper. Drop large spoonfuls of batter into the pans, alternating colors (there's a good image here of what it should look like). Don't stir. Bake for however long the recipe calls for and let the cake(s) cool before icing.

Buttercream: 
Recipe from: Six Sister's Stuff
 
- 1 c.  butter
- 1/2 c. milk
- 6-7 cups icing sugar

Beat the ingredients together. If it's too thin to spread, add more icing sugar, and if it's too thick, add more milk. Assemble and ice your cake.

Chocolate peanut butter cup cake ( new & updated)

This is my favorite cake recipe that I keep tweaking until I get it perfect. Rather than modifying the original post over and over again, I thought I'd just post an updated one.

Chocolate cake:
Recipe from: Hershey's 

Ingredients:
2 cups sugar
1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup HERSHEY'S Cocoa
1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup boiling water
Mix together the sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Beat in the eggs, milk, oil, and vanilla. Stir in the boiling water and pour into 2 prepared 9-inch cake pans. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-35 minutes.


Peanut butter filling:
recipe from: Allrecipes 

 Ingredients:
- 1/2 c. butter, softened
- 1 c. peanut butter
- 1 1/2- 2 c. icing sugar
- 3 tbsp. milk

Beat all the ingredients together and use it to ice in between the 2 chocolate cakes. 


Chocolate Ganache:
recipe from: Allrecipes 

Ingredients:
- 12 oz. chopped chocolate( that's 1 of those Hershey's chocolate chip bags)
- 1 2/3c. heavy cream

Place the chocolate in a bowl. In a saucepan, heat the heavy cream until it's brought just to a boil. Pour the hot cream over the chocolate and whisk until smooth. Refrigerate until thick and then use it to ice the outside of the layer cake.

 

Berry coffee cake

I made this coffee cake for my aunt's 50th birthday. I topped it with some leftover icing from last night's carrot cake.

We were in the park so I wasn't able to get any good photo's of just the cake so this is a picture of my aunt and I with the cake.

Berry Coffee Cake:
recipe from: food.com

Crumb topping:
3 tbsp butter
1/6 c. granulated sugar
1/6 c. brown sugar
1/4 c. flour
1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Combine all the ingredients together until crumbly.


cake:
 1 1/2 c. flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 c. butter
1 c. sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
3 tbsp sour cream or yogurt
1/3 c. milk
2 c. berries ( I used blueberries and blackberries)


Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt. In a separate bowl, beat together the butter and sugar until fluffy. Add the eggs, vanilla, sour cream, and milk and then gradually add the flour mixture Pour half the mixture into a prepared 9 inch cake pan. Put the berries on top and then pour the remaining batter on top of the berries. Sprinkle the crumb topping on and bake at 350 degrees for 30-45 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Carrot Cake

This is one of my favorite tried and true cake recipes. It's so delicious and the icing is really rich and creamy.  I wish I had gotten better photos, but I was taking this to someone's house for dinner so I couldn't just cut into it and show up with a partially eaten cake. This time ( the time that I took the photos) I made it as a layer cake, but I would HIGHLY recommend making it as a bundt cake. It's much better that way because it's way denser and holds together better.  Also, note that this is the kind of icing that doesn't thicken or firm up so it's best if you just pour it on top right before serving ( as you can see in the photos, I tried to make a layer cake and ice it with this recipe and it didn't look the prettiest ). The next time I make this I will do a long photoshoot and hopefully update these pics!

Carrot cake:
Recipe from " The Best of Bridge Cookbook."
Note: This is enough cake batter and enough icing for a bundt cake ( even though the picture is of a layer cake)

Cake:
2 c. sugar
1 1/2 c. oil
6 eggs
3 c. flour
4 c. finely grated carrots
1 tsp salt
2 2/3 tsp. baking soda
 1 tbsp. cinnamon

Beat together the oil and the sugar and then beat in the eggs one at a time. Combine the dry ingredients and then add them to the egg mixture, beating until blended. Mix in the grated carrots, careful not to over mix, and then pour the batter into a greased bundt pan. Bake for 45 minutes to an hour (or until a toothpick comes out clean) at 300 degrees Fahrenheit

Icing:
8 oz. softened cream cheese
1/4 c. softened butter
2 1/2 c. icing sugar
2 tsp vanilla.

Beat well and pour over the cooled cake right before serving.

Lemon berry layer cake

 The cake is flavorful and has a great texture!!! I don't know what else to say other than that it's really good...

Lemon Cake: 
recipe from: Averie Cooks
2 eggs
2 c. sugar
1 1/3 c. buttermilk
1 c. oil
1/2 c. lemon juice
1/4c. lemon zest
1/4 c. Greek yogurt or sour cream
2 tsp vanilla extract
3 3/4c. flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 1/2- 2 c. raspberries.

Beat together the eggs, sugar, buttermilk, oil, lemon juice, zest, yogurt, and vanilla. In a separate bowl mix together the flour and baking soda and then add the dry to the wet and mix until just combined. Toss the raspberries in a bit of flour to keep them from turning the batter pink and then carefully stir them in. Pour into 2 prepared cake pans and bake for 25- 45 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool before icing.

Blueberry Buttercream:
recipe from: The Kitchen Paper

2 c. blueberries or any other berry
2 tbsp. sugar
2 c. butter at room temperature
4-6 c. powdered sugar
2 tsp vanilla

In a saucepan over medium heat, heat the berries and the sugar and break the berries apart with a spoon. Allow to cool. Beat together the butter, powdered sugar, and vanilla and then add the blueberries.


Notes:

 *The icing is a little bit runnier then your average icing because of the blueberry juice so it won't ice perfectly but it will thicken up when you refrigerate the cake.

Banana Cake Bars

Its cake and there's no chocolate, or peanut butter, and there's' fruit inside it but it's still delicious and definitely worth your while. They're super sweet, full of flavor, and moist ( sorry couldn't think of a better word)

Ingredients:

Recipe from: Taste of Home

1/2 c. butter

1 1/2 c. sugar

2 eggs

1 c. sour cream

2 c. flour

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

2-3 mashed bananas

Beat the butter and sugar together on high speed for about a minute. Add in the eggs and sour cream. In a separate bowl combine the flour, baking soda, and salt. Mix the 2 mixtures together and stir in the mashed bananas. Pour into a 9 by 13 in pan lined with baking paper and bake at 350 degrees for 20-40 minutes ( or until a toothpick comes out clean, it depends on your oven.)

Icing:

 8 oz block cream cheese

1/2 cup butter

3-4 cups icing sugar

1/4 tsp cinnamon( optional)

Beat the cream cheese, and butter together. Add the icing sugar until its your desired consistency and add as much cinnamon as you would like.

Chocolate peanut butter cup cake

This was my Dad's birthday cake and its the best cake I've had in my 14 years on this earth. My whole family's been talking about it since it entered our fridge. If you need a cake for anything or if you just want cake, make this! It tastes like a giant Reese's peanut butter cup and its the best cake I've ever had.

See the new updated version of this recipe!

2 minute mug brownies

Mug brownies are genius. This is by far my favorite mug brownie recipe and this is great  if you want a little something sweet but don't want to make a whole pan or spend lots of time baking.

 Mug brownie:
Makes one very small serving so if you want more then that just double it. ( I don't know why but the consistency's not as good  if you triple it or quadruple it.)

Ingredients:
1 tbsp cocoa powder
1 tbsp brown or white sugar
1 tbsp flour
1 tbsp water
1 tbsp oil

Mix everything together in a mug and microwave for about 30 seconds.The top should be bubbling when you take it out. Just be careful not to microwave it for too long or else it will get all weird and rubbery.

Enjoy!


UPDATE ( March 18, 2015)
Below is my new favorite mug brownie recipe. If I ever make it again anytime soon I'll update the photos and make a new blog post. Please note that this one makes about 3 times as much.

Ingredients:
1/4 c. flour
1/4 c. sugar
1/4 c. milk
2 tbsp. cocoa powder
2 tbsp melted butter
a pinch of salt

Melt the butter and then add everything else. Mix and microwave for about a minute.

Chocolate Banana Bread

I first found this recipe at Joythebaker Its not too sweet and really  chocolaty. The original recipe had chocolate chips in it and I didn't have any on hand but it was still great even without!

Chocolate Banana bread:
recipe from: Baking from My Home to yours


Ingredients:
2 cups of flour
1 cup cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
2 bananas mashed
3/4 cup buttermilk ( I just used regular milk and added a tbsp of lemon juice)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit
Mix the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and baking powder

In a separate bowl beat the 2 sugars, and butter. Add the eggs one at a time and then the bananas. Add in the dry mixture and then the buttermilk.
Pour into a pan lined with baking paper and bake for 30 minutes. Then cover it in foil to keep the top from burning and bake for around 30 minutes or until a knife comes out clean.


Enjoy!