Strawberry Rhubarb Coffee Cake

Yesterday, I mentioned on Facebook (I know some of you are cringing at the F word) that I was eating a piece of strawberry rhubarb coffee cake for breakfast. (No need to tell me how boring my life is, I already know.) One of my friends requested the recipe, so here we are.

This photo was taken 2 days after I made it so it's not as pretty as when it first came out of the oven but it's still delicious!

My mom brought this recipe to us when she was here visiting last month and I just made it again for the Gardener on Father's Day. He's got a thing for rhubarb and brown sugar topping...

With rhubarb season still in full swing, it's nice to have a new recipe to use. Rhubarb is one of those great seasonal foods that comes into season so fast and produces like mad. Rhubarb can be used to make some of the best home made deserts but after 5 or 6 9x13 pans, even yummy rhubarb crisp gets old. When my mom made this coffee cake for us last month, she followed the directions and only used 2 cups of chopped rhubarb, but for the most recent cake I made, I used at least 2 cups of rhubarb and about as much chopped strawberries as well. Actually, I'm just guessing on the amounts, I hardly ever measure anything. I also upped the baking time by about 10 minutes with all of that fruit just to make sure it all cooked through. It still turned out plenty moist. I think next time I'll double the brown sugar topping too, it's really the best part of the cake if you ask me.

Rhubarb Cake
1/2 cup butter softened
1-1/2cups white sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup buttermilk
2 cups chopped rhubarb

1 Tablespoon flour (for coating fruit)

1/4 cup soft butter
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 cup packed brown sugar

In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar. Beat in egg and vanilla. In another bowl sift together dry ingredients. Mix dry ingredients alternately with the buttermilk into the butter sugar mixture. Coat the fruit in the flour and add to the batter. Stir until combined then pour into a greased 9x13 pan. Mix together the butter, cinnamon and brown sugar with a fork and sprinkle the mix over the cake batter. Bake at 350 for 45 min to an hour. You should probably let it cool before digging in because the molten fruit WILL burn your mouth. Just sayin'.