The Daring Bakers make Yeasted Meringue Coffee Cake

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.

Holy cow was this good!  When I realized that I was going to be making this without any extra hungry people around to help me eat it (other than Hey, Babe and Little Man) I decided that I was either going to have to cut the recipe down or make half of it a savory version.  After sitting back and thinking of all the interesting filling possibilities we had in the pantry, I knew that cutting the recipe down was no longer a viable option.

I narrowed down my choices to three.  A savory pizza-like "cake" stuffed with chopped onions, pepperoni, mozzarella and herbs, and two sweet versions.  The first sweet cake had the standard chocolate, cinnamon and nut filling provided in the original recipe and the second had blueberries with a dusting of cardamom. 

I had no trouble getting the dough to come together, the only adaptation to the given recipe that I made was to use 2 yolks instead of one of the whole eggs that were called for to eliminate the waste the meringue would otherwise have created.  I did chose to allow it to rise in the fridge overnight so that I wouldn't have to deal with it the next day, taking it out of the fridge to come to room temperature a few hours before I'd need it (we have a cold house).

When the pepperoni version was baking in the oven my mouth started watering, it smelled so tempting that I could hardly wait to try it.  It was incredibly tender and moist and I said to Hey, Babe that even if the other two version were awful I'd still make this again.  Next time I might add some more cheese, but other than that it was delicious.

After having finished dinner I was curious to see if dessert would be as good.  I tasted the chocolate version and decided it was my favorite.  Then I tasted the blueberry version and decided that it was my favorite.  But when I tasted the chocolate a second time I changed my mind again.  Can you see where this was going?  They were both so delicious I really can't say which I liked more.

This dough was so easy to work with and has so many possibilities for filling variations that I know I will have to try some more versions.  I can see cream cheese, or apples, or sausage and peppers, or broccoli and cheddar, or...I think I need to go eat something.  All those possibilities are making me hungry.

Find the challenge recipe here.