Hi Karen,

This recipe was originally submitted by a customer of ours and we tested it and updated it. We have to assume that the style of the crumb cake is not to be sweet. Regarding the amount of mix, our measurement is a cup of our Baking & Pancake equals to 140 grams. 4.5 cups would actually equal about 22.2 oz, so you are right that there is more in the 24 oz bag than 4.5 cups. I would hold out about 1.5 oz of the flour.

I believe there is an error in this recipe. It calls for 24 oz. or 4 1/2 cups Pamela's Baking & Pancake Mix and 24 oz. is a lot more than 4 1/2 cups. There also isn't any sugar in the cake base which leaves a rather tasteless cake. I added a cup of sugar and 1 1/2 tsp vanilla to the cake base; used blueberries as the fruit, and made the crumb topping as directed and it was delicious.

So, I halved the recipe for a taste test. My 9x6 deep dish pan ended up being too small and the topping overflowed and burned on the bottom of the oven. The cake took 45 minutes to cook through while the topping singed all around the edges. The topping was really wet, difficult to 'crumble' and looked nothing like the photo when baked. However, the flavor of the fruit and the crumb topping was good. The cake turned out surprisingly moist--I expected drier from the previous review--emulsifying the egg and oil helped I believe and making sure the mix wasn't compacted when measured. I am giving the recipe 3 stars however as the cake without the topping is bland, like it's missing a bit of sugar or salt or something. I know this type of cake isn't supposed to be really sweet, but in retrospect most recipes do call for a tablespoon or so of sugar in the cake to cut the bitter of the flour.