Pumpkin Cake with Crumb Topping - easy fall dessert recipe (2024)

FAQs

How do you keep crumb topping from sinking into batter? ›

When adding to cakes, be sure to add it to thick, dense batters. Thin, liquidy batters will cause the crumble topping to sink instead of staying on top of the cake.

If you find that your pumpkin cake is too moist, isn't holding it's shape and is gummy in certain areas, it's usually caused by too much liquid in your recipe.

American Coffee cake—also referred to as gugelhupf or Austrian German: kaffekuchen—evolved from other sweet dishes from Vienna. In the 17th century, Northern/Central Europeans are thought to have come up with the idea of eating sweet cakes while drinking coffee.

A well-made crumb should be firm yet tender, and chewy, with big chunks—like granola. The best way to achieve this is to use cold cubed butter. Using room-temperature or melted butter will cause the topping to spread out and flatten when it bakes, rather than standing pert and perky.

Ingredients: Streusel is typically made with a 1:1:2 ratio of flour, sugar, and butter. Crumble topping, on the other hand, has a higher ratio of sugar to flour, typically 1:1 or 1:1.5. This gives crumble topping a sweeter and more crumbly texture. Texture: Streusel is denser and more chewy than crumble topping.

Sour cream is one of the fattiest dairy products; the extra fat content (for example, adding sour cream to a cake instead of milk) will make the cake moister and richer, says Wilk. "Fat, in any form (butter, lard, cream, etc.) shortens gluten strands, which essentially leads to the most tender baked goods," she adds.

Instead of using premixed pumpkin pie spice (which has probably been sitting around for months on a grocery store shelf), make your own by combining cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, cloves, and allspice.

Vanilla, usually. The yellow color is the egg yolks. White cake is made with egg whites, no yolks. Both can be flavored with vanilla, or almond extract. It isn't the flavor that determines the color, it is mostly whether whole eggs, or egg yolks, or egg whites are used.

A buckle is a funny name for an old fashioned fruit studded coffee cake. Like many other desserts in the extended cobbler family buckles take their name from their appearance—grunts grunt as they cook, slumps slump when served, buckles—you guessed it—buckle.

What's the difference between coffee cake and crumb cake? ›

The main difference between the two cakes is the amount of streusel topping. Crumb cake has a thicker layer of streusel topping than coffee cake. Coffee cake can also be made without the streusel topping. You might also see that there's a New York-style crumb cake as well, which has much bigger crumbs.

Why does my crumble topping look like dough? This is usually down to the butter being too warm when mixed together. Also, if the ambient temperature is warm, then the butter will soften after the crumble mix is made and cause it to turn into a dough-like consistency.

Cakes crumble because they've dried out too much. From years of baking, I know that dry cakes happen for one of two reasons; using too much of your dry ingredients or over-baking your cake.

Six common baking-fails, and how they can be prevented. Your cake is too dense A cake that is overly dense typically has too much liquid, too much sugar or too little leavening (not excess flour, as is commonly thought).

After you've filled and frosted your cake with a crumb coat, it's safe to store it in the refrigerator overnight without the risk of drying out the cake. The thin layer of buttercream acts as a barrier to preserve the cake underneath and help it maintain its moisture.