New York Style Crumb Cake

I know what you're thinking. "This isn't a cookie, and it's certainly not from Martha's cookie book." Once in awhile, the situation demands I deviate from my goal of cookie domination.

This Saturday, we had visitors whose two favorite desserts that I make are strawberry shortcake and crumb cake. I recently made the shortcakes, so this time around it was the crumb cakes turn. I've made this recipe a few times before so I knew it was a successful dish.

I doubled the recipe in order to have enough for dessert that evening and to send home with our visitors. The recipe doubles really well and cooks great in a 13x9 inch pan. The recipe suggests spending the time to roll the crumbs into pea sized balls, which I did the first time I made the recipe. However, I've found that just crumbling the topping haphazardly onto the cake looks just as pretty and covers the cake more successfully.

The only change I might add the next time is bumping up the spices in the crumb topping. I would like a stronger cinnamon taste as well as an addition of something like nutmeg.

Here's another shot of the aerial view of the cake.