Swedish Coffee Cake is a buttery pie crust topped with a Pâte à Choux mixture, a sweet glaze, and toasted coconut.
I’m doing the Friday happy-dance! Happy about-to-be-the weekend, everyone!
Because this week? Ridiculous!
Please take this Swedish Coffee Cake as a token of my love, affection, and (in)sanity. It is the perfect weekend-recipe.
A Volvo commercial came on the tube and it reminded me to finally post about this amazing coffee cake. For those scratching their heads, Volvo is Swedish. If you’re wondering about the other word(s) up there, it’s Pâte à Choux (paht ah shoo) and it is French for cream puff pastry. I’m getting all edumacational on you today.
By the way, WHO thought of spreading Pâte à Choux on top of a buttery pie crust? That was GENIUS!
The very first time I made this, I remember talking to myself out loud, questioning the recipe. I just couldn’t see how, a) this was a “coffee cake” and b) there’s cream puffs on top of a pie crust! Noone else sees this as kinda odd? That’s okay. What’s important is that this actually works. So much so that every time I make it, my treadmill and I chill for 2 hours. Truth be told, the treadmill chills while I sweat like a pig.
Apart from paht ah shoo and pie crust, here’s what we’re dealing with; sweet vanilla glaze that’s supposed to be an almond glaze, but I personally can’t stand almond extract. It’s almost up there with my hatred for watermelon. I love almonds, but you can keep the extract.
Also, and to finish it off, we sprinkle it with a generous amount of toasted coconut, grab our coffee cup and indulge.
Make it, you won’t regret it.
ENJOY!
Swedish Coffee Cake
Ingredients
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 stick (8 tablespoons) cold butter, cubed
- 2 tablespoons cold water
- 1 cup water
- 1 stick (8 tablespoons) butter, room temperature
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract or almond extract
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 3 whole eggs, room temperature
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 2 tablespoons butter, softened
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract or almond extract
- 1 cup flaked coconut, toasted
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375F.
- Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
- Place flour in a mixing bowl.
- Using a pastry cutter or fork, cut in butter until mixture is crumbly and dough holds together when pressed.
- Transfer dough to previously prepared baking sheet; press and shape dough in a 10-inch circle. Set aside.
- Combine water and butter in a large saucepan; bring to a rolling boil, making certain that butter is melted.
- Remove from heat and stir in vanilla.
- Add flour and whisk until well blended.
- Return to heat and stir vigorously until mixture is shiny and pulls away from sides of pan.
- Remove from heat and let stand 5 minutes.
- Transfer mixture to your mixer’s bowl.
- Add eggs, one at a time, beating well before adding the next egg.
- Continue beating until mixture is smooth, shiny and holds together.
- Spread mixture over prepared pie crust.
- Bake for 30 minutes, or until lightly browned.
- Set on a wire rack and let cool completely.
- In the meantime, prepare the glaze.
- Combine powdered sugar, butter, milk and vanilla in a mixing bowl; beat until thoroughly combined.
- Spread over cake.
- Sprinkle with toasted coconut.
- Serve.
Nutrition
Nutritional info is an estimate and provided as courtesy. Values may vary according to the ingredients and tools used. Please use your preferred nutritional calculator for more detailed info.
This was the heavily guarded family-secret recipe of a girl I went to high school with, only she called them “Almond Puffs.” I have been searching for a recipe to match what she used to bring to school off & on for the better part of a quarter century. (Good god, I feel old!)
I made these and they are exactly what I hadn’t been able to forget! I used almond extract & toasted almonds, because that matched my memory, but since the pie crust & choux are just a base, I look forward to experimenting with pumpkin and cranberry flavors over the holidays.
I just feel so grateful right now that my search is at an end. Thank you!!
That’s so wonderful to hear! I’m very happy you enjoyed it! Thank you for chiming in! 🙂
Inspiring try but needs attenton. I made this with some adjustments and will keep on developing it. First, the recipe has uncorrected errors as noted regarding water and milk. That’s often a deal breaker in trying a recipe, but I went ahead. When I checked out other pastry chouxs, I noticed that this recipe leaves out a little sugar and salt to keep it from not tasting bland. Third it has twice as much icing than what I consider appropriate.
Most of all, it’s not very Swedish and so I recommend some adjustments. This kind of pastry would be made on a flaky dough vs. a crumbly pie crust especially if it’s a coffee cake. I’ll try puff pastry dough next time. In addition to 2 teaspoons sugar and 1/2 teaspoon salt, I added 1 teaspoon of cardamom to the pastry choux. Replacing coconut flakes with almond slivers also makes it typical Swedish as coconut is typically for macaroons or combined with chocolate or fruit.
I agree- recipe is missing water for crust and milk for icing that should be drizzled over the top in my opinion not spread on.
I use another recipe that calls for 4 eggs in the choux pastry and 1 tsp almond extract. I like that it is not sweet – no added sugar.
The “pie” crust comes out flaky if you don’t over work it.
I don’t know how Swedish it is but I learned this from my mid-western mom and have been making it for years.
And, definitely agree, toasted almond not coconut but she used vanilla instead of almond so coconut might go well with vanilla. Not a bad recipe, just fix the two errors. 😊
Are you able to correct the errors in the recipe?
In my family, this was called Swedish Kringle – it’s very like a popover crust. It’s delicious. Ours was always in a rectangle, but I like what you have done.
Thank you, Sandra! 🙂 Hope you enjoy it!
Thank you for this recipe — I made it for my mother’s weekly tea party with a music student and it was a wonderful success.
I thought I would warn you that I identified two errors in the recipe: 1) the instructions neglect to mention when to add the 2 tablespoons of water to the crust 2) the milk in the glaze is not cited in the ingredients.
I made this on a sheet of aluminum foil greased with butter and traced a 9-10 inch circle on it as a guide for my pie crust, which I made by freezing a stick of butter for a short time and then grating for quick incorporation. The choux pastry was so easy to throw together and to spread thickly on top of the crust, and though it baked up looking huge and unruly (the way choux pastry does), it settled into a thin, dignified pastry round as it cooled.
Because the milk was omitted from the ingredients, I made a judgement call on the amount — instead of opting for a thin, drizzle-able glaze, I kept it very thick and spread it on while the pastry was still just a little warm. This melted the glaze gently and helped it distribute over the entire pastry to lovely effect. I sprinkled/pressed on the toasted coconut, which proved to be QUITE a lot of coconut (though I was using a very thin flake which might have something to do with it).
My audience loved this and asked for seconds! It’s so quick and easy to throw together, and despite its simplicity, it’s just unusual enough to catch the eye.
Liss,
Thanks for pointing that out about the omission of the water to the butter and flour for the crust. I questioned it myself, never having made a crust with only butter and flour… I can’t wait to try this recipe this weekend! (Since I haven’t made the recipe yet, my rating will be inaccurate.)
I really want to give this a try. It will work find for the rest of the family but now I need to see if I can deglutenfy it so I can enjoy it. (yes, that’s a new word I created). It’s also a major pain in the tush to have to do in the real world. I’m wondering since you don’t care for almond extract, which bakers must be VERY exacting with. While I just add blops and glugs of vanilla extract to recipes (I haven’t measured this ingredient in years) I’m sure I get more vanilla extract in most recipes than what is listed. HOWEVER…..when it comes to almond extract that is a COMPLETELY different kettle of fish. It’s probably one of the strongest extracts or flavorings on the market today. A TINY few drops goes a LONG way. Considering your aversion I’m wondering if you didn’t get something early in life that had just WAY too much in it? It’s a shame because when used properly its a wonderful flavor. Now about that watermelon thing. HOW can you not like watermelon? I don’t think I have EVER heard of someone who dislikes watermelon. I don’t see how it can be so disliked. It’s sweet, its easy to eat, its just an all around great fruit. I’m still a bit speechless over this one. Sure, the seeds can be a nuisance at times but the flavor is better with the seeded variety than with seedless versions. I’m just shocked, completely shocked. I will say, don’t EVER eat watermelon with cottage cheese. I did that in a salad one time and was astounded at how HORRIBLE that food combination is when tasting the two together. A person would NEVER think this would happen, but it does. I even tried it several times just to make sure something else wasn’t going on. I absolutely LOVE watermelon and I can enjoy cottage cheese at times. I enjoy making salads that has lots of fruits and all sorts of things in it, basically everything BUT lettuce so it never occurred to me. Every other fruit in the world can be eaten with cottage cheese why not watermelon? I’m not sure what is going on between the two but something happens when these two foods are consumed at the same time. It has to be a chemical interaction because multiple times the result was downright revolting to me. It’s just a heads up for people. I want to try the Mariani cherries on this baked confection one of the people making comments said her grandmother adds. That sounds SO delicious. I imagine like any food, different people enjoy different variations.
Is this made in a pie plate or dish. Will the filling hold if it’s nit in a pie plate