Daring Bakers' - Meringue Coffee Cake

The March 2011 Daring Bakers' 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.

Well friends, I made a commitment. I know. I try not to do that too much. But, this was something that I think is going to be a good thing. I joined the Daring Bakers!

For those who may not read as many baking blogs as I do, you should probably start. I can recommend some great ones. But let me tell you about my commitment.

The Daring Bakers are a group of online bakers who blog together to test their baking skills. Each month, a new challenge is posted on the first of the month and all bakers are required to post their challenge blogs on the 27th. Bakers can share their tips, troubles, and finished goods in an online forum throughout the month.

I learned about this group maybe a year ago and was interested in joining then. But this time a year ago, I was up to my eyeballs in tax returns in Satan’s Workshop. I barely had enough time to cook dinners and go to the gym, let alone bake a challenge and then blog about it. This year, now that I’ve escaped to private accounting, I actually have the time and energy to really take on these monthly challenges. This, my friends, is awesome!

So enough rambling. Let’s talk challenge.

This month’s challenge was a filled meringue coffee cake. Sweet yeast dough rolled up with meringue and a filling.

Individually, the elements weren’t overly difficult to work with. I’ve been conquering my fear of yeast this year and thought that the dough came together nicely. I actually even hand kneaded the dough; no Kitchenaid dough hook attachment on this one. As promised by the recipe, my kneaded dough was soft, smooth, and sexy.


The dough is then divided and rolled out into two rectangles. A meringue of whipped egg whites, vanilla, sugar, and salt is spread on top of the rectangles.

Out of the entire challenge, the only real swearing came from trying to separate the egg whites. For some reason, it took about 6 eggs to get the 3 egg whites I needed and at least couple egg whites ended up on my countertop. Filling is then sprinkled on top of the meringue.


The dough is rolled up lengthwise and the ends are brought together to form a ring. I discovered a couple things while rolling up the dough. First, don’t spread the filling all the way to the long sides of the dough. If you do, you’ll end up with a mess of filling trying to overflow out of your rolled up log.


Second, you should spread the fillings all the way out to the short side edges of the dough so that there’s filling throughout the whole ring. If you don’t, you’ll end up with a piece of cake at the seams without any filling. Not to worry, I ate that piece so no one else would have to…

Since the dough made two coffee cakes, I chose to make one filling with Jamie’s All-American filling of cinnamon, sugar, and chocolate chips. I opted to leave out the pecans because I’m still unsure of any nut allergies in my new coworkers.



For my second coffee cake, I wanted to go with one of my favorite flavor combinations: sharp cheddar and apple.


I took my coffee cakes in to the office to share with my coworkers. The chocolate chip one was gone within an hour or so, but everyone that tried the cheddar and apple one stopped by my cube to tell me how good it was. The meringue melts into this tasty sticky goo that went well with both the sweet and the savory fillings. The rolled up dough looks incredibly impressive and makes everyone thing you’re way cooler than you are. I’m totally ok with faking coolness through baked goods.

For Mission #1, I’m going to call it a win. I’m actually really excited to be part of this group and see what we do next month!