The awfully sinful treat is here!
The last time I baked this was in the year 2010. I still remember it was meant as a treat for everyone, including those who celebrated my birthday with me at the Goethe Institut. The occasion was memorable; I also earned myself a true blue German birthday song from everyone in the class: ‘Zum Geburtstag viel Glück…’
Making this bread is therefore not just an excuse for myself to indulge in the fragrant aroma of the baked cheese, but also an opportunity for myself to indulge in sweet memories of the past.
For those who are baking bread with soda (from the beer) for the first time, try it – you’ll be surprised and delighted at the amazingly tasty result in just a few simple steps.
Ingredients:
- Plain flour: 350g, sifted
- Caster sugar: 3 tbsp
- Gruyere cheese: 250g, half shredded + half cubed
- Ham slices: 100g, cubed
- Spring onion: 2 stalks, chopped finely
- Dill: leaves of 2 stalks, chopped finely
- Double-acting baking powder: 4 tsp
- Salt: 1/2 tsp
- Ground black pepper: 1/2 tsp
- Any light white beer (I used Pure Blonde here): 335ml
- Melted unsalted butter: 4 tbsp
Method:
- Preheat oven at 190 degrees. Grease loaf pan and set aside.
- Mix all dry ingredients together in a mixing bowl.
- Pour in beer and mix well.
- Pour everything into loaf pan. Smooth and even out the surface.
- Spoon melted butter on top of batter. Bake 40 – 45 min.
- Remove and cool 5 min before removing from pan.
Tricks:
- Using double-acting baking powder in this recipe instead of normal baking powder is the key to ensuring that the will bread rise well.
- Make a simpler beer batter cheese bread without ham and spring onion by using stronger cheeses like Camembert and stronger herbs like rosemary, so as to give it more fragrance.
- Lighter beers are preferred over darker and stronger ones to prevent an embittered flavour of the bread.
- I made a little extra batter and baked these in small ramekins and cups to mimic cute little bread pots (picture above).
Serving:
Makes 1 loaf
