Butter Kuchen (German Coffeecake)

Streuselkuchen

by Cat, (Photo, right, from Wikimedia Commons)

Includes: 1. Butter Kuchen; 2. Butter Kuchen, Soaked Flour Method

See also 1. Plum or Apricot Kuchen; 2. Cinnamon-Coffee Kuchen; 3. Fruit Kuchen.

Kuchen is a German name for coffee cake.  I first learned of this wonderful treat from the Tassajara Bread Book, by Edward Espe Brown (1). He offers two style of Kuchen:  One style is cake-like in texture, often with a streusel topping or a sweet glaze. The Butter Kuchen (presented here) is such an example with cinnamon streusel on top.  The other is Fruit Kuchen, which is more like a tarte: a tart crust topped with fruit in custard.

Another style is the filled kuchen, which is cake-like in texture (either yeast- or soda-risen), with a filling in the middle, such as the Plum or Apricot Kuchen which is made in layers, with fruit in the middle, custard on top. Or the Cinnamon-Coffee Kuchen which has a fruit & coffee layer in the middle.

Wikipedia has a good discussion of the many types of Kuchens (2).

All coffee cakes are intended to be served with coffee or tea, perhaps as part of a Sunday or holiday brunch, a luncheon dessert, or a mid-afternoon “tea.”  They are also great tucked into a child’s lunch bag.

More about coffee cakes

All coffee cakes are intended to be served with coffee or tea, perhaps as part of a Sunday or holiday brunch, a luncheon dessert, or a mid-afternoon “tea.”  They are also great tucked into a child’s lunch bag.

While coffee cakes are traditionally sweet, I prefer not to use refined sugar in my baked goods, so instead I use stevia, raw honey and date “sugar”.  The latter is simply ground dried dates, and makes a great substitute for brown sugar in crumb toppings. Another choice for crumb toppings in Rapadura sugar (unrefined sugarcane juice), but of course, it is real sugar.

Butter Kuchen

This is a lovely yeast-risen cake with a buttery streusel topping, similar to the photo above (Streuselkuchen, from Wikipedia).

The original recipe, adapted from the Tassajara Bread Book, by Edward Espe Brown, called for ⅓ cup brown sugar in the cake, and ½ cup brown sugar in the topping.  I modified both of these to use stevia, honey and date sugar.  The original suggested either unbleached white flour or whole wheat flour for both cake and topping could be used.  I use whole hard white wheat and unbleached white flour.

If making this during the holiday season, stir ½ tsp ground cardamom into the flour used in the cake batter.

Serves 9 – 12.

Update 2012, after learning how to do sourdough: I’d like to make this using sourdough starter to create a sponge (with half the total flour and all of the water) that would rest overnight on counter. Remaining flour and ingredients (without the yeast) would be worked in the next day.

Ingredients & Equipment:

Cake:

• ¼ cup lukewarm filtered water
• 1 Tbsp dry yeast
• 1 Tbsp honey, divided
• 1 cup whole milk
• 1 tsp Unrefined sea salt
• ¼ cup butter
• 2 eggs
• ¼ tsp stevia extract powder
• ½ cup unbleached white flour
• 2 ¾ cups whole wheat flour

Topping:

• ¼ tsp stevia extract powder
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 Tbsp cinnamon
• ¼ cup date sugar
• ½ cup butter

Equipment:

• 1 cup glass measure
• small saucepan
• 2 small bowls
• large mixing bowl
• wooden spoon
• hand mixer
• 9 x 13 rectangular cake pan

Method:

1. Stir 1 tsp honey into water in glass measuring cup; add yeast and proof in a warm spot about 5 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, scald the milk, then remove from heat and pour into small bowl.  Add remaining 2 tsp honey along with the salt and butter.
3. Once this mixture had cooled to body temperature, stir in the proofed yeast.
4. Beat eggs with stevia and 1/2 cup white flour in large bowl.  Then add whole spelt flour alternately with the milk/yeast mixture, stirring well after each addition.
5. Pour batter into 9 x 13 greased pan, cover with damp cotton cloth, and let rise 45 minutes.
6. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 375⁰ F and make the topping:
7. Sift stevia and cinnamon with the flour into small bowl.  Stir in date sugar, then cut in butter.
8. Sprinkle topping over the risen cake batter.  Bake 30 minutes, or until edges pull away from the side of the pan, and the middle is dry when tested with a toothpick.

Butter Kuchen (Soaked Flour version)

This is an adaptation of the above recipe, including a pre-soak of the whole grain flour to improve nutrient content and bio-availability.  I’ve experimented with this technique on regular bread, using yogurt in the presoak with limited success.

Spelt vs wheat: Spelt is a sweeter flour and can be used for the crumb topping. I don’t recommend it for the yeast dough because it doesn’t rise well after the soak. Instead, I recommend using whole wheat.

The purpose of the yogurt is to provide an acidic environment for the grain, which allows it to undergo many of the changes at the molecular level that happen at germination:

• freeing minerals from the phytates,
• partially digesting proteins and carbohydrates, to minimize allergic response and maximize absorbability of the nutrients.

Boiling water is added to the yogurt is to kill the bacteria in yogurt that would otherwise compete with the yeast, keeping the dough from rising.

The addition of baking soda, in theory, is to eliminate an acidic or ‘sour’ taste resulting from the yogurt soak. Theory tested 9/29/08 (see below for details):  successful.

Ingredients & Equipment:

Pre-soak:

• 2 Tbsp plain unsweetened yogurt
• 1 cup boiling water (if using wheat) OR ⅔ cup boiling water if using spelt
• 2  cups whole wheat flour OR 2¼ cups whole spelt flour

Cake:

• ¼ cup lukewarm filtered water
• 1 Tbsp dry yeast
• 1 Tbsp honey, divided
• ¼ cup butter, soft
• 2 eggs
• ¼ tsp stevia extract powder
• 1 cup unbleached white  flour
• ½ tsp (1 tsp) Unrefined sea salt (1 tsp)
• ½ (1 tsp) baking soda

Topping:

• ¼ tsp stevia extract powder
• 1 cup whole spelt flour
• 1 Tbsp cinnamon
• ¼ cup date sugar or Rapadura sugar
• ½ cup butter

Equipment:

• 1 cup glass measure
• small saucepan
• 2 small bowls
• large mixing bowl
• wooden spoon
• hand mixer
• 9 x 13 rectangular cake pan

Method:

Pre-soak:

If you are new at doing a pre-soak, you may not know what a proper sponginess might be. Plus the amount of liquid needed to attain proper sponginess is different with each batch of flour. You don’t want the mix to be too runny nor too thick.  You want to be able to beat it by hand easily, yet have a batter-like feel that will develop as you beat the mixture. It won’t get spongy until near the end of the 100 strokes.

1. Add boiling water to yogurt in small bowl or measuring cup and stir until mixed; this is to denature the yogurt so that it’s probiotics will not compete with the yeast. Measure whole grain flour into bowl.  Stir in yogurt mixture. If too runny,add more flour; or not spongy enough, add more water (or milk) 1-2 Tbsp at a time until dough is spongy, beating 100 strokes with wooden spoon to work up the gluten.
2. Press waxed paper against entire surface (to keep it from drying-out); let rest overnight in a warm place.

Next day:

1. Stir 1 tsp honey into warm water in glass measuring cup; add yeast and proof in a warm spot about 5 minutes.
2. Mix remaining 2 tsp honey and the soft butter in small bowl. Add eggs and stevia and beat well. Stir in proofed yeast.  Then stir into presoaked flour.
3. Sift unbleached flour, salt, and baking soda; then stir into batter.  This is easiest with a stand mixer. Batter should be fairly soft and easy to stir without kneading.
4. Pour batter into 9 x 13 greased pan, cover with damp cotton cloth, and let rise 30 -35 minutes (or 45 minutes if using wheat).
5. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 375⁰ F and make the topping:
6. Topping: Sift stevia and cinnamon with the flour into small bowl.  Stir in date sugar, then cut in butter.
7. Sprinkle topping over the risen cake batter.  Bake 30 minutes, or until edges pull away from the side of the pan, and the middle is dry when tested with a toothpick.

Testing the presoak method

Testing 9/29/08: 1/3 cup boiling water was not enough to denature the yogurt, so I omitted the 1/3 cup milk and used 2/3 cup boiling water.  Used whole spelt flour for pre-soak.  Dough is very soft, sponge-like.  Didn’t have 9×13 pan so used 9×9.  However, dough rose over the edges and as I added the topping, most fell off.  So I scraped off as much topping as I could and moved the dough to a 10×10 casserole dish.  This caused the bit of topping left on the dough to be buried in an inner layer, which is actually pretty good.  Then I sprinkled the remaining topping on top.  Result:  Pretty good; not as sweet as the original.  Cake texture is very airy.  No sour taste, so the baking soda is a good addition; however, next time I’ll cut the amount of salt and soda from 1 tsp to 1/2 tsp each, to avoid the slight sodium taste.  And I think it baked too long.

Testing 10/11/09: Used whole wheat instead of spelt; forgot to replace milk with extra boiling water.  This mixture remained dry, hard to work (instead of soft and sponge-like). Added another 2 Tbsp water, then used stand mixer to work it. Next time, use more water (or less flour) if using wheat. I also added another 1/4 cup water extra to proof the yeast. In future, I’ll simply use spelt instead of wheat. Used my new 9×13 pan–good size for this. Oops, accidentally set oven at 425 instead of 375!

Result: Definitely too dry, but that’s probably because I used too high heat, and could have used even more water in the presoak, as my mixture was definitely not spongy. I had added a total of 3/8 cup extra; perhaps use at least 1/2 cup extra or even 3/4 cup; enough so that the pre-soak mixture is sponge-like.

Conclusion: Best to use specified amount of liquid, and start with lesser amount of flour, then add more flour as needed to get desired sponge texture. Or start with specified amount of flour and add more flour or water as needed to get desired sponge texture.

Testing 11/7/09: Used only 2 cups whole wheat for sponge. Added boiling water to 2 Tbsp yogurt, to make 1 cup, then stirred into flour. Needed to add another 3/8 cup water to get the right sponge texture, then beat 100 strokes. Covered and let sit overnight. Total 1 cup water + 2 Tbsp yogurt for 2 cups whole wheat flour. Next day, much easier to work in the remaining ingredients with my stand mixer. Rose nicely, and a bit more in oven, tho some spots fell. Baked 40 minutes.

Result: Texture is reminiscent of a sponge cake; taste is nicely sweet and buttery. No sodium taste. Only slightly dry; perhaps should only have baked 35 minutes. Still, best yet.

References:

1. Tassajara Bread Book, by Edward Espe Brown
2. Wikipedia on Kuchens: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuchen