Sourdough coffee cake is a sweet, vanilla cake with hints of sourdough, a cinnamon sugar filling, and a buttery crumb topping. An easy favorite, this delicious cake serves well as dessert or an exceptional breakfast treat.
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One of the best ways to turn a normal morning into a special occasion is to bake a sweet treat.
This sourdough coffee cake is one of my go-to recipes because it suits a holiday just as well as a Sunday morning.
A coffee cake is simply a cake traditionally served with coffee, typically with a crumb topping or perhaps a drizzle of icing.
This sourdough coffee cake is light and sweet, swirled in the center with a gooey cinnamon filling. The same filling used in the center is also used as a crumble topping, which I find to be both delicious and efficient.
It’s a great recipe for using up sourdough discard, and that classic tangy flavor is the perfect balance with a buttery, crisp, cinnamon crumble.
Served with cold milk or hot coffee, this cinnamon coffee cake is a big family favorite breakfast, right up there with sourdough cinnamon rolls and sourdough banana bread.
Why You’ll Love Sourdough Coffee Cake
Delicious go-to – It’s sweet, but not too sweet! The spice of the cinnamon and the warm, buttery flavors of the vanilla cake work well with the sourdough tang. Use discard for bolder sourdough flavor, or active starter for a milder tone.
Year-round favorite – Coffee cakes are always good, and cinnamon is a flavor that’s a hit all year. It’s light enough for spring and summer while bursting with all the warm, cozy flavor for fall and winter.
Sourdough discard – Coffee cakes are one of my favorite ways to use sourdough discard. Discard adds so much moisture and flavor! If you’re interested in more ways to incorporate your discard into breakfast, I compiled a list of 20+ sourdough discard breakfast recipes just for that purpose!
Ingredients
Oil: Any neutral oil will work, I prefer avocado oil. Coconut oil would be melted and slightly cooled for use in the cake batter.
Brown sugar: Combined with cane sugar to sweeten the cake and topping, brown sugar gives a deep molasses flavor and produces a golden color in the bake.
Sourdough starter: For this recipe, you can use active starter or discard.
All-purpose flour: I love all-purpose flour for this recipe, as it gives consistent results and maintains a tender and light crumb.
A full ingredient list with exact amounts can be found in the recipe card below.
How to Make Sourdough Coffee Cake
Step 1: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and grease a 9×13-inch baking dish. In a medium-sized mixing bowl, stir the cinnamon crumble ingredients (melted and cooled butter, brown sugar, cinnamon, and flour) until completely combined. Set aside.
Step 2: In a large mixing bowl, cream the oil, cane sugar, and brown sugar until smooth.
Step 3: Add the eggs, vanilla, sourdough starter, and milk. Mix well.
Step 4: In a separate bowl, whisk the salt, baking soda, and flour until combined. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and fold with a spatula until just combined. Don’t overmix the batter.
Step 5: Pour half of the coffee cake batter into the prepared baking dish. Sprinkle half of the crumble mixture evenly on top. Pour the remaining cake batter over the crumble, then sprinkle the rest of the crumble mixture over the top of the batter.
Step 6: Bake in the preheated oven for 40-50 minutes. The edges will start to turn golden, and a toothpick inserted should come out clean. Cool completely before slicing and serving.
Long Fermented Version
Note: The cinnamon filling won’t be fermented for this recipe, but the batter can be fermented. Keep in mind that a fermented cake batter typically results in a denser, less fluffy cake.
Step 1: Combine the oil, sugars, eggs, sourdough starter, milk, and flour. Cover with a tight lid or plastic wrap (to prevent a hard crust from forming) and leave at room temperature for 8 to 24 hours.
Step 2: After the fermentation time, preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and grease a 9×13 baking dish.
Step 3: In a medium mixing bowl, stir the cinnamon crumble ingredients (melted and cooled butter, brown sugar, cinnamon, and flour) until completely combined. Set aside.
Step 4: Add the remaining cake ingredients (vanilla, salt, and baking soda) to the fermented cake batter. Mix briefly, just until combined. Be careful not to overmix.
Step 5: Pour half of the cake batter into the prepared baking dish. Sprinkle half of the crumble mixture evenly on top. Repeat with the other half of the cake batter and crumble mixture.
Step 6: Bake in the preheated oven for 40-50 minutes. The edge of the cake will start to turn golden brown, and a toothpick inserted should come out clean. Cool completely before slicing and serving.
Tips
- You can make the quick version the day of, or start the day before to allow it to ferment. Fermentation not only helps break down the grain and reduce phytic acid, but it also adds a stronger tangy flavor. Keep in mind that a fermented cake batter will typically yield a denser cake, so you’ll lose some of the light, fluffy texture.
- A stand mixer will make working with the long-fermented batter much easier.
- You can make this recipe with active sourdough starter or discard. Either will work since we are using a leavening agent.
- You can make this dairy-free by using a neutral oil, rather than butter, in the crumb topping. Also, swap out the milk for almond or coconut milk.
- If the flour isn’t being fermented, I sometimes use einkorn flour instead of all-purpose for easier digestion.
- If you are new to sourdough, check out my post on how to make a sourdough starter and how to care for a sourdough starter.
How to Serve Sourdough Coffee Cake
- Serve for breakfast or dessert with a strong cup of coffee or a glass of milk.
- Serve alongside a zucchini frittata for a fabulous brunch.
- Pair it with a spiced chai ice cream in the fall, or even a honey lavender ice cream in the summer.
- If you make this coffee cake dairy-free, you can also pair it with this dairy-free pumpkin spice ice cream!
Recipe FAQs
No, it’s not made with coffee, but it’s typically made for coffee! A coffee cake is topped with a crumble, whereas a traditional cake is frosted.
This sourdough coffee cake tastes best when eaten on the same day. You can store it in an air-tight container at room temperature for up to three days or in the fridge for up to two weeks.
You can also freeze the cake for up to three months. It’s helpful to cut into individual portions and freeze them individually. Wrap with plastic wrap or parchment paper in a freezer-safe container. Thaw and gently reheat for a few minutes before serving.
This is purely preference! Coffee cake makes a delicious and special breakfast, but it can easily be served for dessert, as well!
You can use all-purpose or einkorn flour. When you are substituting einkorn flour, you will need slightly more einkorn because it absorbs less liquid than all-purpose. The batter tends to be wetter, but the results are delicious either way.
Here are some common reasons for a cake sinking in the center.
The oven was not preheated.
The batter was overmixed. Mix just until it comes together. There will be lumps in the batter, and that’s okay.
The oven door was opened too often, causing the oven temperature to fluctuate.
The baking soda may be old. It’s recommended to replace your baking soda every 3-6 months if it’s stored in an open container.
Sometimes bumping your baking dish or setting it down too roughly can cause the center of the cake to deflate.
More Sourdough Recipes from the Farmhouse
- Sourdough Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Sourdough Beignets
- Double Chocolate Sourdough Discard Bread
- Sourdough Pastry Braid
- Sourdough Discard Lemon Bread
- The best Sourdough Brioche Cinnamon Rolls
If you try this recipe and love it, I would love it if you could come back and give it 5 stars! Tag me on Instagram @farmhouseonboone.
Sourdough Coffee Cake
Ingredients
Crumb Topping
- 3/4 cup butter, 171 g melted
- 1 cup brown sugar, 160 g
- 3 tablespoons cinnamon, 15 g
- 1 cup all-purpose flour, 140 g
Cake
- 1 cup oil, 216 g
- 1 cup sugar, 201 g
- 1/2 cup brown sugar, 106 g
- 3 large eggs
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract, 8 g
- 1/2 cup sourdough starter, active or discard (113 g)
- 1 1/2 cup milk, 354 g
- 1 teaspoon salt, 7g
- 3 teaspoons baking soda, 17 g
- 3 cups all-purpose flour, 420 g
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and grease a 9×13-inch baking dish.
- In a medium-sized mixing bowl, stir the cinnamon crumble ingredients (melted and cooled butter, brown sugar, cinnamon, and flour) until completely combined. Set aside.
- In a large mixing bowl, cream the oil, cane sugar, and brown sugar until smooth.
- Add the eggs, vanilla, sourdough starter, and milk. Mix well.
- In a separate bowl, whisk the salt, baking soda, and flour until combined. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and fold with a spatula until just combined. Don’t overmix the batter.
- Pour half of the coffee cake batter into the prepared baking dish. Sprinkle half of the crumble mixture evenly on top.
- Pour the remaining cake batter over the crumble, then sprinkle the rest of the crumble mixture over the top of the batter.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 40-50 minutes. The edges will start to turn golden, and a toothpick inserted should come out clean. Cool completely before slicing and serving.
Notes
- You can make this dairy free by using coconut oil rather than butter in the crumb topping. Also, swap out the milk for almond or coconut milk. The flavor will be slightly different, but still very yummy.
- See post for the long fermented directions.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Making this for a Saturday morning treat! I am long fermenting it and wow is that dough thick! Hope that is how it is supposed to be! Can’t wait to try this tomorrow!
Mine is really thick too, I can’t imagine adding the rest of the ingredients to it. I started mine last night
Just made this coffee cake and it occurred to me, as I watch it baking, that the crumb topping and cinnamon filling recipes may be switched. It makes sense to me, now, that the crumb topping should not have butter in it as it will just melt into the cake on top and the cinnamon filling which doesn’t contain butter should be on the top. It was a late epiphany but…there it is! Haven’t tried it yet, but it smells so so good!
Nichole, thank you for this epiphany. This makes total sense and I’m so glad I read all the comments.
My family loves this coffee cake! The first time I made it, school was canceled because we had gotten a ton of snow. The kids and our lab were outside playing in this long awaited winter wonderland. So I threw this together for when they came inside. I panicked a bit because I ran out of flour before I made the filling & topping. So, I decided bisqick would have to do. It was the only other thing I could think of that might work. So I hoped for the best, and it turned out great!! This recipe is a keeper!
Great recipe.
I made a mistake but it turns good anyway.
My Family church loves it .. thanks again//
one little detail: can you add in the printible recipe the long fermentation instructions, please. thanks again
Hi Lisa, thanks for sharing this recipe! I attempted it this morning as a special weekend treat for my family. I was super nervous to make it because it’s the first recipe I’ve ever attempted with my sourdough starter.
I have some trouble-shooting questions:
What size pan do you recommend? I used a 9×9 glass baking dish and I feel like a much larger pan would be better suited because my dish was full to the brim and my cake wasn’t done in the center even though the top was very brown after cooking at 350° for one hour.
Would cooking for 1.5 hours at 325 have cooked it throughout better?
I wish the crumb step would have been better explained because I whisked mine (I’m a novice baker) and it created more of a paste that sank to the bottom of my cake 🙁
Like one of the other commenters, I was also wondering if there’s a missing ingredient for the middle layer? It felt strange to use a raw flour mixture in the middle. If it is indeed just supposed to be a flour mixture, what is the purpose of the raw flour layer (once again, I’m a novice baker and am trying to better understand the chemistry of baking).
Thanks again!
Karly, these are Al good questions/comments. Did you ever get an answer back?
Kathy,
I think the first mistake was the size of baking dish you used…
I used a spring form pan. Followed the recipe as written. It was one of the most amazing coffee cakes I’ve ever baked! I’m baking 40 yrs n have made many coffee cakes in my day. By far this is no.1 in my book. Use the right size ban n give it a go again! I believe you will not be sorry…
I had all these issues as well. My cake boiled over several times too.
The mixture was not crumbly so I forced it to be. My top was very very brown as well :/
So disappointed as i used a lot of butter and flour for this to be such a flop.
Kathy. Sorry I forgot to mention I did do the long ferment…..
This for Karly not Kathy…sorry
I commented previous to comment posted… N it didn’t post right away. So I’m trying again.. ☺️ i think the problem was size pan you used. I baked in a spring form pan n it was beautiful n amazing…!!? 😋😋 Follow directions as written n you should have the best coffee cake…. I did long ferment though… Key I think.
I was wondering the same I think the filling recipe is supposed to say topping and the topping recipe to say filling. I’m disappointed I didn’t realize that until I did it but if you look at the photo the paste was definitely supposed to go in the middle.
It may have had that mistake in the past (can’t remember), but if it did it has been fixed and what it says currently is correct. The middle layer is dry. Hopefully it worked out for you.
In the directions you say to melt the butter with brown sugar, cinn, and flour. You don’t have butter listed in the cinn filling ingredients. Are you talking about the butter you have listed in the Crumb Topping ingredients? Thank you for taking the time to clarify😊
Is your einkorn flour just regular einkorn berries that you ground yourself or is it all purpose?
Aloha!
When fermenting do you leave it on the counter or in the fridge?
From what I understand, fermenting requires room temperature. Cold will “rest” the yeast and will not work properly until it gets warm again.
Actually, I believe fermenting can be either in the fridge or on the counter, the yeast won’t be active in the fridge, but the cultures and bacteria will still be breaking down the flour. Since this recipe doesn’t rely on yeast to rise, it’s not important for the yeast to be active.
Is there an ingredient missing from the cinnamon filling? I might be missing something, but I’m only seeing dry ingredients which is making the “filling” more of a flour mixture. Do I need to add milk or butter to make it a liquid?
From what I can tell, the cinnamon filling IS dry. No need to add anything else to it. Now the crumble topping, that’s a different story.
I made these for Christmas morning and they tasted AMAZING!! Thank you for sharing this recipe!!
I was curious though, is it supposed to be a very dense cake? Because mine turned out very dense, it was not light and fluffy. Did I do something wrong?
Even with it being dense, the flavor was so delicious!! I will be making this again.
The coffee cakes I have made are somewhat dense (using Bisquick’s recipe). I have also see it that way in a local bakeshop. It is delicious!