Cranberry Orange Coffee Cake

Am I the only person who goes crazy buying fresh cranberries when they're on sale at Christmas, only to have a freezer full of unused cranberries come February?

Please say I'm not.

Anyway, I had to make a coffee cake to bring to a church brunch the other day. I'm not really much of a cake person.

But I am a cranberry-orange person. And a streusel person.

I'm also a butter person; the 9x13 version of this recipe uses an entire pound of butter. Sorry, not sorry.

This is a fairly sweet coffee cake; you could probably cut the sugar in the cake by at least a half cup, since you still have the streusel. It's also very dense and heavy; surprisingly hefty and filling for a cake.

You can easily halve the recipe for an 8x8 cake if you want something a little more suitable for a family, but the 9x13 size works great if you're bringing it to a brunch, as I was.

Cranberry Orange Coffee Cake

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease a 9x13 inch pan and set aside.

In a medium bowl, whisk together 2 cups flour, 3 tsp. baking powder, 2 tsp. baking soda, and 1 tsp. salt.

In a different, small bowl, combine 2 cups sugar and the zest of 2 large oranges (or 4 tangerines/clementines). Rub the sugar and zest together with your fingers until fragrant; it will clump together a little bit as the sugar moistens from the zest.

Cream 2 sticks (1 cup) butter and the sugar mixture until fluffy, about three minutes.

Add in 4 large eggs, one at a time, beating each one into the mixture before adding the next. Beat until smooth.

Beat in 2 cups plain Greek yogurt and 2 tsp. vanilla extract. Beat until well combined.

Add the dry ingredients a little at a time, mixing until just combined.

Fold in 2 cups fresh cranberries.

For the streusel:

In a separate bowl, combine 1 1/2 cups flour, 1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar, and 1 tsp. cinnamon. Whisk together.

Cut 2 sticks (1 cup) butter into small pieces. Add the butter pieces to the flour/brown sugar mixture. Cut butter into the flour with a pastry cutter or your fingertips. You're looking for an even mixture of large crumbs--you know what streusel looks like.

Pour half of the coffee cake batter into the pan and top with half of the streusel. Spoon the remaining batter over the streusel, using a spatula to spread it gently across the pan. Top with the remaining streusel.

Bake until golden brown and it passes the toothpick test, about 45 minutes to an hour.