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Ohmygoodness! In the words of my husband “that cake ROCKED!” Probably the best coffee cake ever. Hands down. I used white wheat flour. Man. It was good. And it keeps a long time too! Mine was good for a week. 🙂
Halloooh!
I’m still here! and so is this extra indulgent, feels like fall, crumb-heavy, spiced pumpkin coffee cake with a cinnamon streusel topping and a maple glaze. Ain’t nobody messing around with this one. No way no how. Pumpkin coffee cake to the max in the most deliciously crumbly-glazey way.
So today I’m coming to you live from San Francisco! We’re spending a week on the West Coast involving a road trip from SF to Seattle (which will start today, when I finish this post!) and I can hardly believe this entire trip is almost halfway over already. I’ve been having a blast doing some food photography related work stuff (both teaching and attending classes) and we are making our way through San Francisco one super yummy meal at a time. Literally every time I open my mouth to take a bite of something, I fall head over heels in love.
Yesterday I had a gluten free breakfast sandwich at a little bakery (only because it was the only one left that also had bacon… sometimes a person has to sacrifice), and then *surprise* I loved it so inappropriately much that I was ready to commit to a gluten free lifestyle on the spot and exist solely on those gluten free English muffins. Honestly. Thank you, SF, for being so good to all the Food Lovers.
Sadly this coffee cake is not gluten free, so that’s where my plan reached the end of the road. But I am still dreaming of those gluten free English muffins. When I get an oven back… yes. Happening.
Remember how we don’t have a kitchen? I really wish I could say I baked this in my Easy Bake oven after resurrecting it from some box in the back corner of the basement, but the sadness of the day is that a) that’s not how this happened, and b) I actually never even owned an Easy Bake. My sister got one instead. Maybe all along the blog has been my wishful thinking and trying to make up for my childhood days of longing for that Easy Bake oven. You guys. My destiny. It’s all coming together now.
Focus.
Instead of the Easy Bake scenario, I took myself and a bunch of baking ingredients and a few little baking pans and cookie sheets back to my parents’ house, where there is an oven that works and a happy + large crowd of people who will eat whatever I bake. So I started out by baking these pumpkin biscotti, because my sister made them and they were so cute and delish and I wanted to put them on the blog. She showed me the recipe she used, I tried it, and an hour later I literally pulled two loaves of bread out of the oven. WHAT? Gross, weird, fail. Maybe if I could have had a few years to practice on the Easy Bake oven?
I decided to ditch the biscotti attempt, stop talking with my mom while measuring ingredients, and just go for something simple and fool-proof: PUMPKIN COFFEE CAKE.
Mostly this is fool-proof because it has that overwhelmingly delicious topping and glaze that is so phenomenally tasty that even if you couldn’t get the cake quite right somehow (maybe you had to use an Easy Bake oven or something?) you would still enjoy this for a warm, cozy breakfast on a fall morning. Promise. The topping will be your life.
This cake itself is moist, mildly sweet, cinnamony and warm, and heavy with all the toppings — a soft cinnamon streusel and a warm, thick maple glaze. It’s best served warm, so if you make it the night before you know you’re gonna have to pop that slice (or 7) in the microwave for a few seconds to get the whole thing jazzin up again. The sweetness is the perfect complement to a hot mug of rich, black coffee. Literally salivating at the thought. Plus, it’s easy to make and it will feed a crowd. I am so sure that if you make this for your ____ club or for the morning after Thanksgiving (not that I’m already going there buuuut just in case we might want to be ultra prepared and dwell on food), it will be gone in 2.47 seconds flat.
If you are super awesome, you could put half of the topping through the middle of the cake to get a yummy cinnamon struesel layer baked right in. I got distracted when I was making the cake and forgot to make the super awesome middle layer, but someone please make that happen. It’s giving me really good vibes right now.
Cinnamon Streusel Pumpkin Coffee Cake with Maple Glaze
- Total Time: 55 minutes
- Yield: 12 1x
Description
Cinnamon Streusel Pumpkin Coffee Cake with Maple Glaze! This recipe is super easy to make and it will feed a crowd! Perfect for a fall gathering!
Ingredients
For the cake:
- 1/2 cup salted butter, almost melted
- 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
- 1 1/2 cups pumpkin
- 3 large eggs
- 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon each cinnamon, ground ginger, allspice
- a pinch of nutmeg and ground cloves
For the topping:
- 6 tablespoons flour
- 6 tablespoons white sugar
- 6 tablespoons packed brown sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
- 3 tablespoons butter, melted
For the maple glaze:
- 2 tablespoons butter
- 1 1/4 cup powdered sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1–2 tablespoons maple syrup
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a square baking dish (see notes) with nonstick cooking spray or butter.
- With an electric mixer (or with a large spoon, like I did) mix the butter, brown sugar, pumpkin, and eggs together until smooth. Add the flour, baking powder, salt, and spices. Mix until just combined and pour into the prepared baking dish.
- To make the topping, mix all the ingredients together and crumble with your fingers until a fine-crumbed mixture forms. Sprinkle over the top of the cake.
- Bake for 45 minutes – a little longer if the middle isn’t quite set. The cake should be firm and puffy as pictured.
- For the topping, melt the butter in a small saucepan. Add the powdered sugar and stir it up – the butter will awkwardly soak into the sugar and that’s okay. Add the vanilla and maple syrup and stir it into a nice, smooth frosting, all while keeping it over medium low heat. If you need to, add a tiny bit more liquid to thin it out. When it’s smooth, drizzle over the cake.
Notes
The pan that I used for the pictured version was a really odd size – about a 6×11. If you have something close to that, that would work great but if not I’d go with a square pan. I would recommend 9-inch square baking dish.
- Prep Time: 10 mins
- Cook Time: 45 mins
- Category: Dessert
- Cuisine: American
Keywords: pumpkin cake, cinnamon streusel pumpkin cake, maple glaze
One more thing:
- We are still running around on the West Coast and I would love to have you following along on Instagrammy! I haven’t been able to respond to comments for a few days but we’ll be in the car A LOT today and tomorrow so I’m hoping I can get through them and connect with you that way, too, in addition to the ‘grams. And to everyone who gave us all those phenom recs for places to eat is SF, I can’t thank you enough. We should publish those into a book. It should be titled FOOD FOREVER: SF Version. I heart your foodie souls!
This cake is wonderful! Easy to make & delish! I made it for my family and then a friend and now my son has asked that I make it for his birthday! Total winner!
Like several other reviewers, my cake turned out extremely dense like a brick. The cake was also very bland with only 1/2 cup of sugar. Must rely heavily on the topping and glaze for any flavor or sweetness. Not sure if that’s the reason there hasn’t been any reviews for this since 2014?! Dull cake, won’t be making again.
The rest of the reviews didn’t load for me earlier. I can now see reviews beyond 2014 and as recent as 2022.
How much coffee do you put in this cake. please.?
This cake doesn’t actually contain coffee, but it’s best enjoyed with a warm cup of it!
Made this coffee cake ,very disappointed, drizzled after it cooled ,later when I started to slice ,it was like I don’t know, it wasn’t cake like had to throw it away, sorry it did bake for 48min ,very strange ,as I bake all the time ,nothing ever like this
I know this is an older recipe but I wanted to make a coffee cake for this morning when my kids had off school. This came up in my search and how can I say no to pumpkin? I’m craaaaaaving fall even though it’s still 93 degrees here in Texas and boy oh boy did this cake delivery. I had everything in my pantry already and whipped it up this morning and made the house fill with all the fall feelings. The star of the show? The maple glaze. My 5 year old took one bite and said “I need more frosting”. Now that’s speaking my love language. Your recipes are always hits and this is nothing different. Amazing. Thanks for bringing fall to our house this morning!!
What a lovely way for you and your family to start the day! Thanks for the comment, Angela!
Is there any way I could make this ahead of time and bake it christmas morning?
It’d probably be best to bake ahead of time, and reheat on Christmas morning!
looks good. Yet to try it
I made this last night and it was inedible. The cake was not cakey at all….rather spongy and way too dense. Only 1/2 cup brown sugar in the cake vs 2 1/2 cups flour. The icing glaze was yummy but that is it. I was disappointed because it looked and sounded so good.
I completely agree, Shay. I experienced the exact same results. My family and I were very disappointed, as my desserts always take the cake, but not this one. Dense and bland.
So sorry to hear this didn’t turn out for you, Shay. Thanks for sharing this feedback with us!
I had the same problem as many reviewers – this was very dense and heavy, not cake-like at all. The pictures above also make it look like that, so maybe this is just a difference of taste. The topping was delicious though! Unfortunately won’t be using this cake recipe again.
We’re sorry to hear this didn’t turn out for you. Thanks for sharing this feedback with us!
I love following you on Instagram! This coffee cake is amazing. Thanks so much for sharing.
This was the worst cake I ever made! Dough was too thick to pour and it never rose or cooked beyond a dense mess. Don’t waste your time or money on this!!!!
could one use a gluten free flour mix as a wheat flour substitute?
We aren’t super familiar with gluten free flours so can’t really say – we’d love to hear how it goes!
hey Lindsay! i just found your recipe and i was wondering whether you used canned, Fresh, Roasted?, or maybe Boiled pumpkin??
i have a 7 by 11 pan and probably would use that one. looks good
This looks so amazing. Great recipe:)
This looks so amazing. Great recipe:)
i like the way you making it
My hubs grew up in Chicago and coffee cake was a regular item at the weekend breakfast table. He recently talked about how much he misses coffee cake, especially now that our family had to become gluten-free. After looking at a number of recipes, and knowing I had 2 cans of pumpkin in my pantry leftover from fall, I decided to make yours. It was the most decadent version of a coffee cake and the topping and glaze were key factors. Being gluten free for a few years, I regularly convert recipes to a GF version. I did not read the reviews prior to making the batter and topping. Like others, I found the batter to be heavy and thick. I chalked it up to the very dry cold weather we’re having. I did sub half the butter in the batter with applesauce. I also used coconut sugar instead of brown and doubled the amount of spices based on personal taste and baking powder based on experience. Once I had all of the flour mixed into the batter, I began adding cashew milk until the batter was something akin to a heavy quick bread batter. Put it in a 9×9 stoneware baking dish and topped it with the streusel. I had to bake it much longer to get the middle somewhat done. I made the glaze and served it along side my hubs bacon and fried eggs. It was wonderful. It came out tall and beautiful with a lovely cakey crumb and that topping + the glaze was lovely. I hope my experience helps with some of the trouble others have had. Thank you for the beautiful recipe. My 5 star rating is based on the outcome with the tweaks I made.
Do you think I could bake this in small loaf pans? I️t looks amazzzzzing
Hey Lindsey! Can this recipe be made ahead and placed in the fridge till morning, to be baked then?
Hmmm we haven’t tried that, so aren’t really sure! We’d probably just bake the entire cake the day before, and then just warm it before serving the next day.
I followed the directions exactly for this cake, used a 9″ square pan and baked it for approx. 1 hour. The cake is not ‘cake-like’, but rather a solid mass almost like a pumpkin pie. I am wondering if the pumpkin puree to flour portion is incorrect. Too bad, I was really looking forward to brining this if for the folks in my department as a Thanksgiving treat. Sadly, my 50+ years of baking didn’t shine on this one. What did I do wrong?
What is the texture supposed to be like? Flavor was great when I made this but its was really dense, wasn’t sure if it was supposed to be this way. Thanks!
I feel a little silly. Disregard my previous comment. I got the sourdough cake from another site and noticed my mistake when I went to make said cakes. Well, for anyone who bakes with sourdough and hopes to bake this cake, I did combined the two successfully. But my glaze come out really thick and sweet. So not sure what’s up with that. I even added less powdered sugar than stated (about 3/4 cup). but nonetheless, it is tasty in moderation. Which is what I need lol thank you so much for the recipe!
Hi! I plan to make this very soon. As I’ve had my first (and only) pumpkin craving in 30+ years and picked up some puréed pumpkin in a can today. Well, I found recipe after recipe of quick breads. That won’t do for this 30+ year craving. But this will for sure. I just had a quick question; can I merge this recipe and your sourdough pumpkin cake recipe? Use the sourdough cake as the cake in here? I just want to make sure…because it would be tragic if this amazing strusel topping sunk to the bottom… all most as tragic as all of us who were denied easy bake ovens. Here I thought I was the only one, and am still holding said grievance against my mother. Haha
I just want to note for people, this cake should be kept in the refrigerator. I made this on Sunday (2 days ago) and we went to cut a slice today and it was absolutely rancid. It tasted fabulous on Sunday right after it came out of the oven, so I am so disappointed. I think that because of the high water content, with the amount of pumpkin in it, it just has to be kept cold. Be warned.
OKAY, I am sad when I read the reviews and think they are probably doing something wrong. As a semi-experienced baker, I am going to make these and review them in the morning. The recipe reads flawlessly and the pictures are so tasty.
Hope you like it, Ashley!