The March 2011 Daring Baker’s Challenge was hosted by Ria of Ria’s Collection and Jamie of Life’s a Feast. Ria and Jamie challenged The Daring Bakers to bake a yeasted Meringue Coffee Cake.
When I first saw the challenge, I couldn't help but think to myself how this recipe bore a striking resemblance to the December Daring Bakers challenge of Stollen, at least in appearance, anyway. Fortunately for me, it was a lot more up my alley. The recipe itself reminded me of a babka - a yeasted rich dough filled will chocolate and cinnamon sugar - except that this recipe yielded a wreath-shaped cake and was also filled with a layer of meringue.
The IF and I gathered early on a Sunday morning to take on this recipe. We began by mixing up the dough and letting it rise, which was a fairly painless process. The recipe aptly instructed that we were to, "...knead the dough for 8 to 10 minutes until the dough is soft, smooth, sexy and elastic." While I have heard dough described as elastic, and maybe even soft and smooth, sexy is not how I usually think of dough. The thing was, that our dough really did seem sexy - we couldn't keep our hands off it! We watched as our dough went through all the phases of maturity - unformed childhood, awkward adolescence with bulges and bumps all over the place, the shaggy frat boy stage, and finally, sexy and smooth. Once we set up the dough to rise, we began prepared the fillings: meringue, cinnamon sugar, and chocolate chips.
When the sexy dough had risen, we separated it into two, one for the IF - Hugo, and one for me - Bill (or Javier, depending on who you ask). The IF and I rolled out Hugo and Bill, respectively, and filled them with a layer of meringue, then the cinnamon sugar, and then the chocolate chips.
Rolling them up proved to be the biggest challenge of the day - first into a log and then into a wreath - as the meringue was bursting through the rolled dough. Fortunately, everything came together after baking. After another rise and an egg wash, it was into the oven for Hugo and Bill and what came out were two beautiful browned coffee cakes. Below, first Hugo and then Bill.
We couldn't wait to taste, and cut some slices of Hugo while he was still warm. In short, the coffee cake was very tasty. On the pieces we tried, no meringue remained after baking, but instead left a pleasant moistness throughout the cake where it had been.
Overall, I thought the recipe made a very nice dough that was fairly easy to prepare. The IF and I spent a lot of time entertaining ourselves while the dough was rising, but this could be a very nice cake to make while also preparing other foods or taking care of tasks around the house. While we stuck to the traditional fillings provided as part of the recipe, I could definitely see trying out different fillings and making this again for a tea party. Yum! I'm off to eat some more cake!
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