The South Padre Island Flip Flop Foodie: BLUEBERRY CREAM CHEESE BREAD

I have been away for quite a while - my Mom is in the hospital, and has been since mid-September. Baking and doing fun things has really been placed on the back-burner. This has been one of the first cooking/baking endeavors in weeks. It is a worthy project for a return to blogging!

I found this recipe online several months ago and pinned it on my Pinterest Board of recipes I'd like to try. It just looked so yummy and I finally got around to making it. Despite it taking a boatload of mixing bowls, spatulas, measuring cups, and measuring spoons - I'm definitely happy with the outcome. Being a first try, I didn't change the recipe. I did have to bake it longer. It simply was not done at the recommended time. So, the recipe I've typed below includes that note...and a few other of my thoughts and additional instructions (in italics usually).

I found the recipe at Tasty Kitchen and encourage you to link back to the site and scope out their many yummy recipes. This one was posted by Savannah in the Breads section. In my opinion, it is more like a cake - and was eaten with a fork by my family. We also liked it after it was at room temperature...everything firmed up nicely and it was easier to slice. The recipe said prep time was 20 minutes...well, she's a better cook than me. It took me over 50 minutes to pull this together and get it in the oven. Of course, I had to stop for many photos...maybe that was the problem.

So, here it is...lots of effort, but worth it for a special breakfast or brunch.

Blueberry Cream Cheese Bread
by Savannah at Tasty Kitchen: A Happy Recipe Community

INGREDIENTS:

For the Bread Batter:

1/2 cup butter (I used salted)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 egg yolks
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup milk
1 1/2 cups Blueberries (up to 2 cups she said - I used a pint)
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
2 egg whites
1/4 cup white granulated sugar

For the Filling:

8 ounces, weight, Cream Cheese (softened)
1/2 cup sugar
1 tablespoon flour
1 whole egg
1 tablespoon Orange zest

For the Glaze:

2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon water

METHOD:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Filling:
In a medium bowl, combine cream cheese, sugar, 1 tablespoon flour, whole egg, and orange zest; beat until smooth. Set aside.

Glaze:
Stir together the glaze ingredients (2 Tbsp sugar, 1/2 tsp vanilla, 1 tsp water) and set aside.

Bread:
Cream butter and 1/2 cup sugar until fluffy. Add salt and vanilla. Add egg yolks (be sure to save the egg whites for later) to the sugar mixture; beat until creamy. Set aside.
In another bowl, combine 1 1/2 cups flour and 1 tsp baking powder. Add this to the butter and sugar mixture, alternating with milk (1/3 four, 1/2 milk, 1/3 flour, 1/2 milk, last third of flour. Very stiff batter.)
In another bowl, coat blueberries with 1 tablespoon flour and add them to the batter. (Note - when I do this again, I'm changing this to the last addition - I squished many berries by adding them to such a dense batter - which is lightened in the next step with egg whites...it makes sense to me to add them at the end. However, I followed recipe and added them at this point).
In a separate bowl, beat egg whites until soft peaks form. Add 1/4 cup sugar, 1 tablespoon at a time, and beat until stiff peaks form. Fold egg whites into batter.

Putting it into pan:
Pour 1/2 of the blueberry batter (or a little less) into a floured and greased pan. Smooth it with a spatula.
Layer the filling over the batter - smooth it with a spatula.
Finish with the remainder of batter - carefully smoothing to the edge of the pan. This will create a layer of "cheesecake" between the blueberry bread layers.
Pour glaze over top of UNBAKED loaf and place in preheated 350 degree oven for 55-60 minutes.
(As stated above, mine took longer to bake - a total of 1 hour 15 minutes and it was perfect)

I allowed the bread to cool 20 minutes in the pan on a rack. I turned it out onto a tray and allowed it to firm up for another 15-20 minutes or so...then we couldn't wait any longer to try it.

It was still crumbly (and firmed up much more within a few hours). Very, very delicious! We had large slabs with our coffee. Not overly sweet but, a bit more cake-like than bread-like to me. I just had another piece with coffee while I wrote this post. Excellent the next day as well!!!