We'll be Blue without You!
We've had a house guest for the past few weeks. She has been the easiest house guest ever. She didn't ask to be fed (although we tried), bathed, taken anywhere, she didn't complain when the house was a mess (and that's sayin' something!) or when we forgot and left her at home by herself. In short, the BEST.
Flat J, as we've come to call her, is part of a class project that my Gr. 1 neice is doing in Calgary. It's based on the book called Flat Stanley by Jeff Brown. Every kid in the class sends out a flat version of themselves to some friend or family in another town and the recipients treat the paper version like it's a house guest, tourist. Well, it's time now for us to say 'Goodbye' to our Bestest Guest. So, I decided to bake a cake in honour of her flying away (via Canada Post tomorrow a.m.). Since we will miss her and we'll be 'blue' when she is gone, we thought that something with blueberries would be best (plus I had them on the cusp of rotting in the fridge! AND I'd had my eye on this recipe for a while now).
This recipe for blueberry coffee cake originally came from by newly beloved 'Magnolia Bakery Cookbook'. I love the simplicity of the Blueberry coffee cake thing but I've got some dying lemons that need using. 'Hmmm', I think. Can I add some lemony crap to this? Well folks we're gonna try. I discovered that there isn't a lot out there (in internet land) that combine these two flavours. Is it because they suck together? Anyway, to Flat J, the Real J and her Gr 1 class... this is for you!
Blueberry/Lemon Coffee Cake
(inspired by The Complete Magnolia Cookbook)
2 cups all-purpose flour (unbleached)
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2/3 cup vegetable oil (preferably canola which is what I used)
2 lg eggs (it says at room temp. I didn't do that so we'll see what we get!)
1 1/2 tbsp lemon zest grated
1 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla 
3/4 cup blueberries, lightly coated with flour
Glaze:
2 cups icing sugar
1/2 cup heavy cream or lemon juice
1/2 tsp vanilla (if using the cream)
Preheat oven to 325 degrees F
Grease and flour a Tube Pan.
Sift the flour, baking powder and salt togethe r in a small bowl (Mmmk - I totally missed the sifting part when I was doing this - let's see how it goes).
In a large bowl mix together the oil, sugar and eggs until light and thick (about 3 min if using an electric gadget and if not - just do it 'til it feels well mixed and light).
Add dry ingredients in three parts, alternating with the milk and vanilla (which I mixed together) and beginning and ending with the flour.
I have to tell you here that the batter felt very wet at this point. I'm crossing my fingers that this turns out b/c it was disturbingly watery.
Fold in the blueberries. I also placed some additional blueberries in the bottom of the tube pan. Pour the batter into the pan and bake for 60 - 70 min. Test and see if the tester comes out clean. Cool in the pan for 1 hr.
Glaze
Place a bowl over some lightly simmering water if you are using cream. Combine the sugar, cream and vanilla in the bowl over the water and blend until everything is creamy. Allow to cool slightly and drizzle over the cake.
If using Lemon juice: Warm the Lemon juice slight and blend with the sugar until everything is creamy. Cool just slightly and drizzle over the cake.
The cake came out beautifully, all my glitches notwithstanding and despite the weirdly watery batter.
We thoroughly enjoyed our little send-off. Flat J was thrilled and everyone shed a little tear before she got into her envelop. The cake topped topped the whole thing off. Thanks to Real J and to her class for involving us in such a fun project!!!
xoxo
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About Me
- Wanda Thorne
- St Michael's Choir School is celebrating it's 75th anniversary year of service to St Michael's Cathedral. Part of the school celebration is a trip to Italy where our boys from Grades 5 - 12 will be performing and celebrating Mass. This blog will be chronicling our adventures. Wanda Thorne is the Vocal Coach at St Michael's Choir School. Gerard Lewis is the Grade 7/8 Homeroom teacher at the Choir School.
About Me
- Wanda Thorne
- St Michael's Choir School is celebrating it's 75th anniversary year of service to St Michael's Cathedral. Part of the school celebration is a trip to Italy where our boys from Grades 5 - 12 will be performing and celebrating Mass. This blog will be chronicling our adventures. Wanda Thorne is the Vocal Coach at St Michael's Choir School. Gerard Lewis is the Grade 7/8 Homeroom teacher at the Choir School.
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3 comments:
I wish I was 'Flat' so I could mail myself there to enjoy some of that!! BTW, love the plate with the blue flowers...it reminds me of something Grandma would have had :)
Ok, the cake is DA' Bomb fo sho!
But, it's funny you mentioned the plate because Grandma did, in fact give it to me. One of the few things that I still have from her - there is a matching bowl that I eat my granola in every morning. Very valuable.
Is it really from Grandma? Too funny, because it just jogged my memory that there's a cup and saucer at Mom and Dad's that grandma gave me in a slightly similar pattern, but pink...missing Grandma lots these days.
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