“Pumpkin Skillet Coffee Cake With Streusel Topping” by Stella Parks
What went well:
I managed to make white chocolate powder without any of the right ingredients or equipment
The autumnal flavors were delightful and hit the nail on the head for a Halloween treat
What went poorly:
I don’t know how to read and forgot to buy pecans
There is white chocolate all over my kitchen
Halloween is usually an exciting time in my household. On Halloween day, we’re usually running out to get last minute costume supplies because we foolishly decided two days beforehand that “ya know what? We should go to that costume party. It will be fun!”.
Unfortunately, this year there was none of that for obvious reasons. But, I was determined not to spend more than half of Halloween day moping around the house and loudly yelling “Curse you COVID!!!”. So naturally, I turned to the internet for inspiration on what I could make to enjoy Halloween while trapped in my apartment.
There was a fleeting moment where I thought I was going to make apple cider donuts, but a quick scan of that recipe revealed it was slightly too much effort for a relaxing Halloween activity. Fortunately, that recipe led me to another recipe by baking god Stella Parks (seriously, she is SO talented. Her book is 10/10, cannot recommend it enough). Her self-proclaimed “pumpkin skillet thing” seemed like the perfect way to celebrate fall.
I jotted down the ingredients, dashed to the grocery store, and got started making it. Things were off to a great start when I read the very first step of the recipe and realized I had forgotten to buy pecans. In my defense, there are 11 ingredients in the streusel topping alone, so it’s not like I missed one of two ingredients. But still, this did not bode well for the recipe.
I measured out the rest of the ingredients and in the process found a bag of walnuts in my pantry. I decided these would have to suffice for a pecan substitute. I am by no means a nut expert, so I’m sure this substitution is offensive to someone’s nut sensibilities. Alas, it’s what I had and another voyage back to the grocery store was not on the table.
Once everything was measured out, making the streusel topping was relatively easy. Everything except for the nuts and the white chocolate go into the bowl of a stand mixer to get beaten together.
When a nice clumpy mixture formed, I chopped up the nuts and added them to the mixer along with the white chocolate.
When things were reasonably well incorporated, I transferred it all to a bowl and put it in the fridge. While there’s quite a lot of ingredients in the topping, it’s not actually difficult to make.
When the topping is done, you just need to make your coffee cake batter. This has yet another 11 ingredients, so I had to pause here to wash my small measuring bowls. When I bought six of them, it seemed like a lot. I see now that I was foolish.
A huge perk of this recipe is that it calls for malted milk powder which I purchased when I wanted to make Stella’s Wonder Bread recipe. It’s been taking up space in my cabinets since then and I was starting to feel like it might have been a mistake to buy so much of it. I’m thrilled to say that I have now used two whole scoops of it, so in another four years it will be all gone!
10 ounces of brown sugar is actually a lot more than you would think.
The first thing you need to do for the batter is pulse the flour together with the white chocolate and malted milk powder in a food processor. Unfortunately, I don’t own a food processor. No problem! The recipe has a food-processor-free alternative: grate the white chocolate on a microplane.
Uh oh… it seems like that instruction to buy a bar of chocolate was actually important.
Upon realizing that I was supposed to grate my chocolate chips on a microplane, I was pretty panicked. If you’ve never grated something on a microplane, you’re absolutely 100% going to grate your fingertips off if you try to grate something as small as a chocolate chip.
I searched around my kitchen to see if there was another alternative that could work here, and I settled on trying to use my immersion blender. This seemed brilliant for all of two seconds.
I knew the missing pecans were a bad omen!
On the first attempt, chocolate went flying everywhere. I had to pause here and think for a bit. It’s pretty scary when the little bullets of chocolate come whizzing towards your face, so I needed to create some kind of shield. One quick rummage around the cabinets later, I had my solution.
All it took was a small bit of arts and crafts and the paper plate made the perfect shield to prevent accidental blindness due to chocolate shards. The second attempt at blending the chocolate went much more smoothly.
It is surprisingly satisfying to turn chocolate into powder.
I worked through the chocolate in batches and in about 5 minutes I had managed to turn all of the chocolate into a fine powder.
After overcoming that challenge, everything else was mercifully straightforward. The chocolate and malted milk powder get added to the flour and the whole thing gets mixed together until it's homogenous.
Then everything besides the pumpkin puree and the egg goes into the stand mixer to be beaten until light and fluffy. Then the egg goes in followed by the pumpkin puree.
Immediately after adding the pumpkin, I was pretty sure something had gone horribly, horribly wrong. The whole mixture had turned from being light, fluffy, and smooth into a gritty disgusting mess.
Gross.
I was unsure of what to do, so I just let the stand mixer keep going. Fortunately, this seemed to be the right answer. The grittiness went away and it turned back into something smooth and appetizing looking.
When it once again looked like something you might actually want to eat, I poured it out into a skillet. If you don’t have a cast iron skillet, just get one. They’re $15 and unless you throw it in a volcano, it should last forever.
The batter was a bit stiff, but flattened out nicely with a bit of help. Once flattened, the topping goes on and all of the hard work is done.
The whole thing is supposed to go into the oven for 35 minutes until it’s 205 degrees Fahrenheit. I don’t know what happened, but mine took another 15 to 20 minutes beyond the original 35 before the center registered 205, but it did finally get there.
When it emerged from the oven, the top had browned beautifully.
Before slicing, you’re supposed to wait for it to cool completely. I normally don’t have the willpower to follow this instruction, but it’s implied that something bad will happen if you don’t wait, so this time I listened.
When it was finally cool, I was quite pleased with how it looked.
To complete it, I just needed to add a bit of halloween decoration. I originally planned on melting the white chocolate to make a spider web pattern on the top. Instead, I ate way too much pizza, gave up on that dream, and settled for this spooky ghost.
The final result was quite tasty. My only critique is that it’s quite rich and I’m not the biggest white chocolate fan. But! Despite my lack of love for white chocolate, it’s a solid pumpkin thing. Stella describes the texture as somewhere in between a coffee cake and a blondie and I think that’s a spot on description. I think it would be even better if it had solely coffee cake texture, so for me it’s a 4/5. If you’re more on team blondie, then I’m sure this would be a 5/5 for you.
For a fall-flavored Halloween treat, it was great. I think it would definitely be a hit at Thanksgiving, so I’ll be saving this recipe for sure. I just won’t buy chocolate chips next time.
