chocolate chip coffee cake

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back to school. back to busy schedules. back to waking up groggy and often moody teenagers that could use another 4 hours of sleep to become the pleasant humans we know and love. this chocolate chip coffee cake may not help with grumpy teens, but it sure does help in the getting them to eat breakfast before school part.

moms everywhere are doing a little happy dance. or maybe that’s just me. it’s back to school season. as busy as things may get during the week, i love getting back to a routine. what i don’t love is force feeding stella breakfast before school every morning.

i get it, 5:30 is an ungodly hour to have to get up and eat. i don’t eat breakfast at 5:30. but i’m not the one calculating equations at 8 am.

the weekend before school started i asked stella for a list of all her food requests. items i could make for her that she would actually eat without nagging from me every 5 minutes. so i spend my sundays prepping fruit, making hard boiled eggs, waffles ^[4] for the freezer, and granola ^[5] for yogurt parfaits.

the first day of school was great. she got herself up and ready on time and ate every bite of breakfast. tuesday she was a bit less enthusiastic, and by wednesday we were back to breakfast nagging and rushing out the door.

last night i made coffee cake. stella loves coffee cake. she also loves chocolate, so i added mini chocolate chips to my go-to coffee cake recipe (from the nytimes ^[6]). chocolate chip coffee cake + streusel topping may be my new favorite breakfast treat.

how do you get kids to eat breakfast?

add chocolate!

now i am not advocating for loading kids up with chocolate before school. but if a small piece of chocolate chip coffee cake gets the turkey bacon, hard boiled egg, and berries eaten i am a big fan.

bakery style chocolate chip coffee cake

Print Recipe ^[7]

Yield: 12-16 servings

chocolate chip coffee cake

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 30-35 minutes

Ingredients:

for the cake batter

• 1/2 cup butter, at room temperature
• 1 1/4 cups sugar
• 2 large eggs, at room temperature
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 1/4 cups sour cream
• 1 cup mini chocolate chips (plus more for the topping- optional)

for the streusel

• 1/2 cup flour
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 4 Tbsp butter cold cut into small pieces
• mini chocolate chips (optional)

Directions:

• butter a 9 x 13 baking pan
• preheat oven to 350°
• cream together the butter and sugar until light and very fluffy – this should take about 5 minutes
• add eggs one at a time, stopping to scrape the sides of the bowl after each one
• add vanilla and mix well
• in another bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt
• on low speed add half of the flour to the butter mixture, add sour cream, then add the remaining flour – do not over mix
• fold in the chocolate chips and spread batter into the prepared pan
• to make the streusel topping combine the flour, sugar, and cinnamon and then cut in the butter – i love my pastry blender ^[8] but you can easily use your fingers – you should have coarse crumbs
• sprinkle streusel over the cake batter (i like to add a few extra chocolate chips too)
• bake at 350° for 30-35 minutes
• cool cake completely before cutting
• store leftover cake covered at room temperature for up to 3 days

enjoy!