Coffee cake... GONE! Who knew?

[storytimewithjoe]

Last night, we had the Anaheim Historical Society over to the house for Giles to give a presentation on old houses, restoration, etc. We had about 18 people over, and all seems to have gone well. Giles really shines when he does these presentations. He enjoys the attention, and he is really good at public speaking. Me... not so much. In fact, I hate it. I really like the behind the scenes part. Since this was a historical function, I did like I usually do - garnished the setting with food. Since our house was built in 1903, I put together some noshies from the 1903 Good Housekeeping cookbook.

The deviled eggs were done.
The grape shrub was ready.
The Boston cookies were baked.

The only thing that had me worried was the German Coffee Cake. The recipe called for a very simple milk-based dough flash-baked and drizzled with butter, cinnamon and sugar. To my mind very blah. BUT, I decided to try it. And if it failed, it failed. The recipe called for it being baked for only about 20 minutes in a tin and then served. So... no pre-doing this puppy. I had to wait. Tin... tin.... tin... OH! I have the perfect thing. Hanging up on the wall, we have a couple of tins - one being an antique. Hell, why not? So I took the tin, cleaned it out, coated the hell out of it in butter, padded in the dough as much as I could, and let it rise. When the time came, I baked it for 25 minutes, coated it in cinnamon and sugar, and put it out. When all was said and done, we had some eggs left over... we had some cookies left over... we had some shrub left over... but the cake was gone... GONE! I received the most compliments on... you guessed it... the cake. Erugh? A few people commented on the wonderful "apple cake". APPLE cake? What the hell? The worst part is... I didn't get a chance to try it. Neither did Giles. ARGH!

So now, I'm gonna have to try to do it again just to see what all the fuss was about. Who knows? I might have accidentally found a fun mock-apple cake without ever guessing. Those Kwazy Edwardians!

Comments

[peacockharpy.livejournal.com]

Well, the Swedish Coffee Bread we serve every year is similar -- a milk and egg bread with cardamom mixed in. We actually roll up a cinnamon -sugar-walnut-and-raisin spiral into it. It's divine.

[joeguppy.livejournal.com]

The mingling by rolling and adding spices I can see. But this recipe called simply for a very, very plain milk-based dough with NO flavoring other than cinn and sugar on TOP! Whoddathunkit that people would like it?

[ronm.livejournal.com]

Please stop talking about all this yummy food. I'm going to gain 50 lbs. just reading your entries!

[joeguppy.livejournal.com]

SOOO not sympathetic right now. I have had a cold for about a week n' a half now, and it has caused me to put on pounds. NOT HAPPY!

[ronm.livejournal.com]

Well, you have to keep your strength up when you're sick. And that's just 'volatile weight' - it'll come off as quickly as it was put on! :)

[joeguppy.livejournal.com]

It had better damned well do just that!

[aliskye.livejournal.com]

That's pretty funny. You'll just have to make it again and see what it tastes like. Poor you. :)

[joeguppy.livejournal.com]

The only problem with being the cook is that I know what goes into the food. If I didn't, I could go into denial about how fattening the recipe is. But since I cooked it, I KNOW how much butter it called for. Part of me thinks - "It is period." The other part screams - "FAT! PURE FAT! BAAAAAD!"

Whaddya want...

[flaming-mo.livejournal.com]

MARGARINE?!

[relaxgettoit.livejournal.com]

No butterfat very goooodd... crisco baadd

[brambleberry.livejournal.com]

You are a recipe tease!

[joeguppy.livejournal.com]

Veddy true.