Crumb Cake 2

I have a lot of recipes, have I mentioned that? Most of them are variations of some other recipe in the collection. I didn't count how many crumb/coffee cake recipes I have, but I'm sure there are over twenty. Each one is different, so I can't simplify the list due to similarity.

This is the first crumb cake that I made that is actually crumbly. Not that I made it right, of course. I added too much baking soda. Actually, I imagined that the recipe called for baking soda and baking powder, so I added baking powder when I shouldn't have. It turned out okay. I'm not fond of the flavor of this, but we shall assume that is simply because I made it wrong. I should start giving myself a gold star when I follow a recipe correctly!

Crumb Cake (Printer-friendly PDF Version)
2 C flour
2 C brown sugar (packed)
1/2 C shortening
1 t baking soda
1 egg
1 C sour milk
1 t vanilla
1/2 C nuts and/or raisins (optional)

At this point you may be wondering what "sour milk" is and whether it is something you want to cook with. My 5 minutes of internet research informed me that back in the days when refrigerators weren't common, milk went sour from sitting at room temperature. Instead of tossing out the milk, they made used it in baking. Sour milk isn't something you can buy at a store; it needs to be made.

To make sour milk you need 1 T vinegar (or fresh lemon juice). Place this in a measuring cup. Add milk up to the 1 cup line and stir.

Let it sit at room temperature for 15 or so minutes. It will start to slightly curdle, which is gross.

Place the flour, brown sugar, and shortening in a mixing bowl. Combine these all together into a crumbly mixture. I cut it like pie dough and stirred it with a fork.

Remove 1/2 C of the crumbly mixture and set it aside. Stir in the baking soda into the mixing bowl full of crumbly mixture.

Once the milk is soured, place it into a small mixing bowl with the egg and vanilla. Lightly beat together. Pour this liquid mixture over the crumbly mixture and stir well.

Pour the batter into a well greased cake pan. Sprinkle the top of the batter with the 1/2 C of crumbly mixture.

At this point you can sprinkle the top of the mixture with the raisins and/or nuts. You can also mix these in the batter before pouring it into the cake pan. I know picky people who don't like raisins or don't like nuts, so it had to be obvious which half was which.

Bake at 350 degrees for 25 - 35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. The bake time depends on the size of cake pan you use. The larger the pan is, the shorter the cook time.