Pumpkin Sour Cream Coffee Cake (Gluten Free)

I've had a bit of extra time at home recently, which has led to lots of time to think about food, and how much I love it. Autumn, besides being my favorite time of year, also includes a lot of PUMPKIN!

...and dessert. Which brings me to the point of this post.


I decided to make this gluten-free pumpkin coffee cake today after staring at the back of my Pamela's Baking & Pancake Mix for the past week, being taunted by the Sour Cream Coffee Cake recipe on the back.

If you're gluten-free (by choice or by necessity) and you've never tried Pamela's pancakes, stop messing around and go buy a bag of this! If you aren't gluten-free, you'll still like this stuff. It's seriously delicious. I am a strong believer in not accepting "gluten-free" as a code word for "delicious-free," and that's what you'll find in this coffee cake. It's the best damn coffee cake I've ever made, it was ridiculously easy, and all it took was a little recipe tweaking.

Treat. Yo. Self.

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Pumpkin Sour Cream Coffee Cake (Gluten Free)

Yield: one 9' cake
Time: 1 hr 10 mins, plus cooling time

Filling:
1 cup walnuts or pecans, chopped to medium pieces
1/4 cup white sugar**
1/4 cup light brown sugar**
2 tsp cinnamon

Cake Batter:
2/3 cup room-temperature butter, unsalted
2 eggs, large
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups Pamela's Baking and Pancake Mix (or equivalent pancake mix)
3/4 cup sour cream
3/4 cup pumpkin puree (pure pumpkin, not pie mix)
2/3 cup white sugar
1/4 tsp pumpkin pie spice

Glaze: (double this recipe if you really like glaze)
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 Tbsp water

Set oven to 350°F.

Mix together Filling and set aside.

For Cake Batter, mix butter and eggs until fluffy, then mix in vanilla. Add Pancake Mix, sour cream, pumpkin puree, white sugar, and pumpkin pie spice. Mix together until incorporated. Spoon 1/2 batter into greased 9" bundt or springform pan, covering the bottom. Sprinkle 1/2 of the Filling evenly over batter, repeat with layer of batter, then sprinkle remaining Filling on top. Insert knife straight down into Batter, moving up and down around the pan in a zig zag motion. Do not smooth out Batter.

Bake for 45-50 minutes when inserted toothpick comes out clean. While warm, run a knife around the edges of the pan. When cool, remove from pan and pour a thin stream of glaze back and forth over cake.

**A note about the sugar: the sugar in this recipe is already reduced from what the back of the bag told me to do, but if you want to further reduce the sugar, don't be afraid to cut down a little bit in the filling.

Happy Little Trees

"Whoops... that's a tree. It's a tree now." - Bob Ross

Everyone's favorite fro'd out painter may or may not have actually said that quote, but I feel like I always heard him say similar things on his show, The Joy of Painting.

The Joy of Painting was one of the best things that the '90s had to offer. You had the feel of a public access television show, a blacked-out studio, and one smiling man with an easel, his palette, and his beautiful bulb of hair. During his half hour show, he would paint beautiful landscape scenes from scratch, showing viewers how easy it was to layer more and more paint, using brushes and palette knives, and then he would add little details with a small brush, bringing the whole painting to life. He did all of this while talking the audience through the process with his soft, calming voice.

I used to watch this show a lot as a child, and his artistic attitude really made an impression on me. Bob Ross never seemed to doubt himself or what he was creating. If some twitch of his hand made a line look a little differently than he intended, you could count on him adding lots of "Happy Little Trees" to turn that section into a beautiful embellishment rather than a mistake. He would often say something along the lines of...

"Just let the painting tell you what it wants to be. Start painting, and see where it takes you. This is the Joy of Painting. I'm Bob Ross."

I have not fact-checked that quote, so it's probably best for me to stop putting words into Bob Ross's mouth.

The point is, I've been thinking about Bob Ross today, and my own life. I'm at the point where I'm almost done with my first (continued) year of my Bachelor's degree, my writing skills are developing more and more, and I finally feel like going for a career that actually fits who I am. I'm not really an "Admin" kind of person, primarily. I'm not satisfied with sitting by the phones, scheduling meetings, and sorting the mail. These jobs have been very helpful to me in their time, but I'm finding that I want more.

Today, I started working on my resume with a friend of mine. Noticing a slight lack of relevant work experience when it comes to writing, she asked about any writing side projects that I had. There was a lack there, too. This blog has been so infrequently updated—my last post was over a year ago! It was at that moment, talking about my resume, that the possibly-fake quote from Bob Ross at the top of this post came into my head.

"Whoops... not much direct work experience with writing. But there's a little bit of relevant experience at these older jobs. And, hey! Editing experience! That's a tree... it's a tree now."

"Whoops... Virginia hasn't been published, and forgot about her blog for a year. But there's still a little bit of material... it's a tree now."

I'm finding that you don't need to have already started with the perfect plan, the perfect position, or the perfect execution for things to work out. You just need to be open, ready to work hard, and be honest with yourself.

So if you're in a similar position as me, and you're standing in front of your own metaphorical easel, seeing a lot of bare valleys and mountains, don't knock those Happy Little Trees. Add them in. Don't be afraid to admit that some of those trees weren't what you expected. Don't be afraid to improvise. Those Happy Little Trees could be just the thing you need.