As you know I was trying to spread out the Cooking Club submissions throughout the month, but not surprisingly I received a bulk of them at the last minute. (I don't blame you, I'd have done the same thing).

Thanks to everyone who took the time to participate. Almost everyone enjoyed making Christine Cushing's Light Swirl Coffee Cake with Maple Glaze and Michael Smith's Apple Butter. Despite the amount of butter and eggs, most people found the cake light and not too sweet. 

I was glad to see that those who tried the apple butter really enjoyed it. I personally loved the apple butter perhaps even more than the cake.

So without further ado here is the second batch of results. Don't forget to check out the March CCC Results: Part I.

From Henry who saw a bundt pan on sale and saw it as a sign to make the cake: The coffee cakes I've eaten in the past were all from the grocery market, which in general are overly sweet and dry. So I was surprised to find this recipe resulted in a moist and not overly sweet cake. Like Linda, I used goat's yogurt and substituted pumpkin spice with a combination of nutmeg, cinnamon, and cloves. I also added a drizzle of honey and icing sugar as I liked the contrast of the dark colour of the cake and the light colour of the honey and sugar. The next time I try this, I will need to fold the two batches of batter a little better, for a better 'swirl' effect. I told my family it was a two-toned coffee cake so no one was the wiser!

From Gill who made it a team effort: I haven't tried the Cooking Club Challenge before, but this seemed to be a perfect March break activity for the girls. My little chefs took all the difficult jobs -- cracking eggs, stirring, turning the mixer on and off and tasting. I got the easy stuff -- washing up, swirling batter and dealing with the oven! I decided to make the apple butter and was so glad that I did. It tastes amazing and filled the kitchen with a brilliant spiced apple aroma. The cake recipe was so easy and the result was a great success, light and fluffy and really tasty: Definitely a recipe to keep and to share.

From Carolyn who tweaked with the recipe to make it lighter: I don't consider a cake with 2/3 cup butter and 3 eggs to be a light recipe, so I made the following adjustments:

• Reduced the butter to 1/3 cup, and added 1/3 cup drained applesauce.
• I didn't have any full-fat yogurt on hand, so I used 3% sour cream.

The results were OK but not a favourite. If I didn't already have some great coffee cake recipes, I would work at perfecting this one, but I think I'll stick with my tried and true recipes. Sorry about the picture, I didn't marble the batter enough.

From Candice who have yet to try a cooking club recipe and not like the results: I loved the flavours of this cake, and it was nice and moist. I'd probably make it again, although I might skip the glaze, since it mostly just dripped off the sides. I changed the original recipe as follows: fat free vanilla yogurt instead of full fat, skipped the apple butter (I didn't have any or have time to make it) and just used a little extra yogurt instead. I also used a combination of cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg and anise in the glaze instead of pumpkin pie spice.

From Irene who agreed that it's the perfect complement to coffee: This was a very easy cake to make, though I did not make the apple butter. I used store bought apple sauce instead and just used cinnamon instead of pumpkin pie spice.  The cake is very light and not too sugary-sweet like I thought it would be because of the glaze. It goes great with coffee!

From Lisa who made a few tweaks which still resulted in a great cake: This cake was super easy to make, and turned out amazing. I just used whatever ingredients I had on hand to substitute (I used sour cream instead of yogurt, honey in place of apple butter and corn syrup, and cinnamon instead of pumpkin pie spice). The first day it tasted the best I thought, because the outer crust had a bit of crispness to it. This is a recipe I would use again.

From Brilynn who's glad to be participating in the Cooking Club again: I made my coffee cake in mini-bundt pans which were adorable even if a little impractical.  The flavour of the cake was great although I would have preferred if the maple glaze was more pronounced.  I think if I made it again I would make a maple icing so that it would be a little thicker. Overall though, a great recipe! See more pictures of her cute mini coffee cake on her blog.

• March CCC Results: Part I
  
  
• March CCC Results: Part III
• March CCC Results: Part IV