Coffee and Walnut Loaf Cake

This cosy Coffee and Walnut Loaf Cake is flavoured with instant coffee, studded with crunchy walnuts, and topped with the most delicious coffee cream cheese frosting. It’s homely, comforting and perfect for a mid-afternoon sweet treat with a hot cuppa!

Quick ingredients overview and substitutes

Let’s talk through the ingredients needed to make the coffee and walnut loaf cake, plus any substitution options:

• Instant coffee granules – are first dissolved in boiling water to make a liquid, and then folded into the sponge mixture. Choose a good-quality, strong coffee for the best flavour (I used Nescafé Gold Blend Instant Coffee).
• Unsalted butter – use soft, room temperature butter so it can be easily creamed with the sugar. You can instead use baking spread or margarine if you’d prefer.
• Golden caster sugar – I love the caramel flavour that golden caster sugar brings to this loaf cake, but you can use white caster sugar instead.
• Eggs – use the best-quality eggs you can find and make sure they are at room temperature. This recipe uses either 3 large eggs of 4 medium eggs.
• Self-raising flour – the added raising agent in self-raising flour will give the loaf cake a lovely rise and fluffier texture. If you’re using all-purpose plain flour just add 3 teaspoons of baking powder.
• Ground cinnamon – an optional addition, but gives the sponge a warm, cosy flavour.
• Walnuts – chopped up into small chunks, added to the sponge mixture and used to decorate the top of the cake. Pecans would also taste delicious in this recipe too!

The coffee cream cheese frosting tastes amazing with this cake

Classic coffee and walnut cake is typically sandwiched together with coffee buttercream. However, for this recipe I decided to switch things up and top it with coffee-infused cream cheese frosting instead. Trust me, it tastes amazing!!! The frosting is made using unsalted butter, icing sugar, full-fat cream cheese and a spoonful of fresh coffee. It’s super quick and easy to make and really does elevate the flavour of the sponge. Of course, you could instead leave the loaf cake plain, add a simple glaze, or even drizzle a little caramel on top. There are lots of options with this recipe!

Quick recipe success tips

• Use a 2lb loaf tin. It’s important to use the same-sized loaf tin to get the best results from this recipe. The ingredient measurements and the baking time are only accurate if you use a 2lb loaf tin. However, if a 1lb loaf tin is all you have, try halving all of the ingredients and reducing the baking time to 45-50 minutes. 
• Use instant coffee. This type of coffee dissolves easily in boiling water and can be added to sponge mixtures/frostings without leaving a gritty texture. Plus it has a strong, bold flavour.
• Use cold cream cheese for the frosting. I’ve found this is the best way to stop the cream cheese frosting from becoming too thin or runny. Just keep the cream cheese in the fridge up until the point you need to add it to the bowl.
• Try not to open the oven door before 60 minutes. This loaf cake should take somewhere between 65-75 minutes when baked at 160°C fan / 180°C conventional. Opening the oven door too early will let the hot air escape and this sudden change in temperature can cause the cake to sink in the middle. As a rule of thumb, do not open the oven before 60 minutes. You can test the sponge by pressing the middle gently with your finger, if the sponge springs back it’s ready. If your finger leaves an indent, bake for another 5-10 minutes. Don’t worry if the sponge has cracked down the middle, this is very normal with loaf cakes and you’ll cover it up with frosting anyway!

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