Rhubarb Coffee Cake

After a lapse of two weeks since the making of the upside-down cake with the rhubarbs, I decided to get out of the rut and finish the remaining gifted rhubarbs by making another cake recommended by Pete - Rhubarb Coffee Cake. Contrary to belief, a coffee cake doesn’t necessarily contain coffee in it. I deduced that Coffee-cakes are those served with a cup of evening coffee/tea/chocolate, and hence the generic name.

This was a really easy cake and it turned out quite satisfactorily. This is again Pete’s mom’s recipe, so I am not going into any fine details to divulge the exact recipe. But this is easy enough for most bakers - novice and experts. 

The rhubarbs are poking out

 
Overall Steps:

1. Peel and dice rhubarbs (about 1.5 - 2 cups)
2. Prepare your version of sponge-cake batter, or any basic cake batter (main ingredients needed: butter, sugar, eggs, all-purpose flour, baking soda, and vanilla extract; for a moist and soft cake, some variations add milk or buttermilk)
3. Gently fold/mix the rhubarbs into the batter (Do not vigorously mix, for you will upset the fluffiness and deflate the air in the batter; remember to not over-mix the batter after the addition of flour)
4. Transfer to a buttered cake pan.
5. Mix ¼ cup of sugar with 1 teaspoon of ground cinnamon. Sprinkle the cinnamon-sugar on top of the cake batter (this step is optional, and the proportions are subjective. It depends on how much sugar and cinnamon you would like on your cake).
6. Bake at 350 F for 45-50 minutes.

I'm not a graceful cake-tester as the huge cut shows

 

 I liked how this cake turned out - simple and a little different, owing to the sour rhubarb and spiciness of the cinnamon. The cinnamon sugar offered a nice crunch and sweetness with every bite. But Anand didn’t like this cake as much as the upside-down cake, although both cakes are quite similar. Well, that is the rule of thumb between us - If I like something, he is likely to not like it, and vice-versa ;). 

Lessons Learned:

I didn't mix the sugar and cinnamon together before sprinkling on the cake. And I didn't use a sieve or strainer to evenly sprinkle the cinnamon-sugar. It would have been better had I had the patience to go over both the steps. You can see a clumsy streak of cinnamon on top, and none at the corners of the cake ;).