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Blueberry streusel coffee cake nestles an abundance of fresh or frozen blueberries into a tender sour cream cake and blankets it all with classic crumble topping.
Why we love this recipe
This is our absolute favorite coffee cake. While it’s originally designed to help process an overabundance of blueberries, it also works great with frozen ones if you can’t (or simply would rather not) live without it in the winter.
It makes the perfect dessert (or brunch or breakfast!) for when you’re craving something a little more cake-like than a crumble or crisp but still want to be bowled over by berries.
What you’ll need
This cake has two components: the batter and the topping.
For the cake batter
Here’s a glance at the ingredients you’ll need to make the cake.
- This recipe calls for a lot of blueberries. You can use fresh or frozen berries, whichever you’ve got. In the video here I’ve used frozen wild blueberries, and you can see that they’ve turned the batter a pretty dramatic purple. That’s totally fine, but if you’d rather keep the batter unstained, use fresh berries. If using frozen, you don’t need to defrost before using — but if you do defrost, drain the excess liquid. You can also reduce the berries in this recipe by up to half if you’d prefer a higher cake to blueberry ratio.
- Sour cream helps create a light, tender crumb and a balanced flavor. You can substitute plain Greek yogurt if you like.
For the streusel topping
And here’s what you’ll need to make the streusel topping. You can substitute chopped pecans, almonds, or pistachios for the walnuts if you like, or leave out the nuts entirely if someone’s allergic.
How to make it
Here’s what you’ll do to make a beautiful blueberry streusel coffee cake. You can see the steps in action in the video that accompanies this post, and get all the details in the recipe card below.
- Mix together the dry ingredients in a large bowl and the sour cream and vanilla in a small bowl.
- Beat the butter and sugar until light and creamy. Beat in the eggs one at a time. Then alternate adding the dry and wet ingredients.
- Toss the blueberries with a tablespoon of flour and stir into the batter.
- Spread the batter into a greased 9×13-inch baking pan. Stir together the streusel ingredients and crumble over the batter. Bake in a 350°F oven for 40-45 minutes.
Expert tips and FAQs
You can use fresh or frozen, farmed or wild blueberries — whatever you like. Frozen berries may turn the batter purple, which is fine if you think it’s fine.
As written, this is a very blueberry-forward recipe. You can halve the quantity if you’d prefer a higher ratio of cake to berries.
Yes, you can! Bake it up to 24 hours in advance of when you want to serve it, and let it cool to room temperature before covering.
This cake is nice and moist, so it will keep well at room temperature for three or four days. After it’s cooled completely, cover it tightly with foil.
You absolutely can! We love the richness and the crunch of the nuts in the topping, but if someone’s allergic or you just don’t have any nuts on hand, you can totally leave them out. Or substitute 1/2 cup old-fashioned oats.
Truth be told, room temperature ingredients really do make a lighter, fluffier, better-mixed cake.
More easy fruit desserts
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Blueberry Streusel Coffee Cake
Ingredients
For the coffee cake
- 2 cups (240 grams) all-purpose flour, plus 1 tablespoon
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon fine sea salt
- 1 ¼ cups (300 grams) sour cream
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 4 tablespoons (56 grams) unsalted butter
- 1 cup (198 grams) sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1 pound (454 grams) blueberries
For the streusel
- ⅔ cup (80 grams) all-purpose flour
- ⅔ cup (142 grams) lightly packed brown sugar
- ⅔ cup (80 grams) chopped walnuts or pecans
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon fine sea salt
- 5 tablespoons (70 grams) unsalted butter, melted
Instructions
- Have all ingredients at room temperature.
- Preheat oven to 350°F with a rack in the center, and grease a 9 x 13 x 2-inch baking pan.
- First, make the cake batter. In a large bowl, stir together the 2 cups flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
- In a small bowl, stir together the sour cream and vanilla extract.
- In another large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer, beat together the butter and sugar until lightened in color and texture, about 3 minutes.
- Add the eggs one at a time, beating to incorporate after each addition.
- Then add the flour mixture in three parts, alternating with the sour cream in two parts and beating on low after each addition until just incorporated.
- Toss the blueberries with the remaining tablespoon of flour and gently fold into the batter.
- Scrape the batter evenly into the prepared pan.
- Then, make the streusel topping. Stir together the flour, brown sugar, nuts, cinnamon, and salt in a medium bowl.
- Pour the melted butter overtop and stir to incorporate evenly into the dry ingredients.
- Sprinkle the topping over the batter.
- Bake until a cake tester inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean except for blueberry juice, 40 to 45 minutes.
- Cool in the pan for at least 10 minutes before serving warm or at room temperature.
Notes
- You can use fresh or frozen, wild or farmed blueberries. Frozen ones may turn the batter purple, but that’s fine if you don’t mind. You don’t need to defrost them before using, but you can if you like. If defrosting, drain excess liquid before using.
- This recipe is very blueberry-forward. If you’d prefer a higher ratio of cake to fruit, you can halve the berries.
- Sour cream gives the cake a light, tender crumb. You can substitute plain greek yogurt if you like.
- To make this recipe nut-free, you can simply omit the nuts from the topping, or substitute 1/2 cup old-fashioned oats.
- Make this recipe up to 24 hours in advance of serving, and keep leftovers at room temperature for up to three or four days. Once completely cool, cover tightly with foil.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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