Yup

Today's the day for me to share the results of my weekend sewing! Or ... so I thought it would be. As it turns out, it has taken me a little longer than expected to wrap up my project. I spent the bulk of my day pressing and clipping and gathering, and I'm getting close. But I'm not quite close enough to post any photographic evidence of my efforts, so you'll just have to take my word for it (for now).

The good news is that L requested a special breakfast goodie this weekend, which meant that I had to adapt one of our favorite coffee cake recipes - with fabulous results. Since I had made Pumpkin Clouds last week, we still had quite a lot of leftover pumpkin in our fridge that was just begging to be whipped into something. And that something turned out to be a pumpkin coffee cake. It has just the right amount of pumpkin-y goodness without venturing completely into pumpkin bread territory. Besides, I'm a sucker for anything with a streusel topping, so this one is automatically a winner for me.

Pumpkin Coffee Cake

Adapted from Cooking Light Magazine

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/4 cup chopped walnuts
• 2-1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon, divided
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 2 large egg whites
• 1/2 cup reduced-fat sour cream
• 3/4 cup canned pumpkin
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon grated nutmeg
• pinch ground cloves

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Combine brown sugar, chopped walnuts, and 2 teaspoons of ground cinnamon; set aside. Place granulated sugar and butter into a large mixing bowl and beat with a mixer at medium speed until well-blended (about 5 minutes). Add egg whites 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Combine sour cream, pumpkin, and vanilla, and add to mixture. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, 1/2 teaspoon of ground cinnamon, ground ginger, grated nutmeg, and cloves, blending well with a wisk. Gradually add flour to sugar mixture, and beat well until combined. Spread half of the batter into a greased, 8-inch square baking pan. Sprinkle half of the walnut streusel mixture over batter. Spread remaining batter over streusel and top with the rest of the streusel mixture.

Bake approximately 35 minutes, or until a wooden pick inserted in the center comes out clean. Allow to cool.