Grape Crumble Cake

As you all know, one of my favorite things to do is to find fun and creative ways of reusing things I already have. It has become a fun, challenging culinary game to me. I had quite a few grapes left that need to be used, especially since I will be leaving to go on vacation to Spain next week. A good way of using a lot of these grapes was to turn them into a moist and delicious cake.

I know Europeans use grapes for cakes and desserts, as well as many other things, much more than we Americans do, but I am doing my best to change that. A friend of mine told me years and years ago that “I was more European than American”, and I take that as a very nice compliment indeed, especially when it comes to food and wine. 🙂

Grapes have been cultivated in the Middle East for at least about 8000 years. Today, many different variety of grapes are grown all over the world. The three primary uses for grapes are for wine, dried fruit (raisins) and fresh table grapes. The varieties of ways in which grapes can be used coupled with the number of countries in grapes can be grown accounts for the fact the world produces about 72 million tons of grapes annually. That’s a whole lot of grapes.

Grape Crumble Cake

You can use any kind of grapes you like for this moist and delicious cake, but I had both red and green grapes, so that is what I used this time.

Preheat the oven to 350* F or 180*C.

Spray a 9″ cakepan with cooking spray and line the bottom with parchment paper.

The Filling

2 cups grapes, cut in half

2/3 cup sugar

6 TBSP water, divided

1 1/2 tsp lemon juice

3 TBSP cornstarch

1 tsp lemon extract, optional

Mix the grapes, 2 TBSP of water, the sugar and the lemon juice together in a saucepan. Bring to a boil. Mix the cornstarch with the remaining water and add to the grape mixture, along with the lemon extract if using. Bring to a boil once again, and let boil for 1 minute. Remove from the heat and cool.

The Streusel

1/3 cup flour

1/4 cup sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

1/4 cup butter cubed

Mix everything together until it resembles sand and set aside.

The Cake

3/4 cup softened butter

1 cup sugar

1 tsp vanilla

1 tsp lemon extract

3 eggs

1 1/3 cup flour

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

Combine all the dry ingredients together and set aside.

Mix the butter and eggs together, adding the eggs one at a time and mixing in between each addition. Add the vanilla then add the flour mixture 1/2 at a time, mixing in between. Mix until everything is well incorporated together.

Fold in the grape mixture.

Evenly spread the batter into the prepared cake pan. Add the streusel topping on top and bake for about 50-60 minutes, or until the cake is set in the middle and a toothpick comes out clean when inserted.

Allow the cake to cool completely before removing from the pan and slicing it up. I have only tested and tasted the little crumbs that have fallen away, but I can already tell you this cake is a definite winner. It was so moist and flavorful. if I can get this much out of just little crumbs, imagine what you will get when you can enjoy a whole slice, or two. 🙂

Have a great day and make everyday great. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.