On crisp Autumn days, doesn’t coffee cake and a hot cup of coffee sound good? It does to me. This one has a secret ingredient: silken tofu.
A big tofu fan, I never cease to be amazed at all of the appealing dishes that can be made from this unassuming, protein-packed food. And not just savory dishes or smoothies: tasty desserts can also be made with tofu.
I whipped out my cute little tofu cookbook and decided to make a coffee cake. The recipe was for Apple Streusel Coffee Cake, but also noted that pears, peaches, or blueberries could be substituted for apples…which was great because I had pears in the fridge.
After checking to ensure I had all the needed ingredients, I realized that the silken tofu I had was only 12 ounces, rather than the 16 called for in the recipe. Time to improvise: I added a quarter of a cup of unsweetened applesauce to make up for the tofu shortage.
The recipe begins with making the streusel topping: sugar, chopped nuts, flour, spices (I added a little nutmeg, too), and melted butter. Oatmeal is finely ground (the instructions say to do it in a blender, but I used my food processor) and added to the other topping ingredients as the final step.
Next, the dry ingredients are mixed: flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. The tofu, butter, eggs, vanilla, and sugar are blended (though I just used my food processor again).
The wet ingredients are added to the dry, mixed, and the batter is poured into the greased baking dish. The chopped pears are pressed on top of the batter, and the streusel goes atop the pears. It baked for about 45 minutes.
My changes: in addition to the the applesauce sub already mentioned, I also added 1 Tbsp of psyllium husk to the streusel topping (to sneak in a little extra fiber), reduced the sugar in the batter a little, and added 1 Tbsp of ground flax seeds to the batter.
Verdict: winner! It was very moist, lightly sweet, and spicy…the perfect accompaniment to a hot beverage (or by itself). I’ll be making this one again – maybe with blueberries next time.
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