It's Queen b'day today, although i hardly know her, but God Bless the Queen for because of her, I got to enjoy ( probably the last ) public holiday before Christmas.
Public holidays are rare and precious in Australia. All year round, we have but only a small numbers of public holidays: The New Years day, The Australia day, The Easter, The Anzac ( which was not made public holiday because it falls on Saturday this year :( ), The Queens b'day, Labour day ( which are yet to be proclaim to be public holiday this year ) Christmas and Boxing day!! We often need to make plans a few months ahead if we plan to go on a short break during the long weekend, the motel will always be fully booked, and the traffic going out of the city would also be quite dreadful, not to mention the stress of driving because of the triple demerit points during public holidays!!
Because my husband have his essay to be completed, and a record book of dangerous level demerit points, we decided not to go anywhere, and just chilled out and enjoy the surprising sunny Monday. To keep up with the Queen b'day's theme, I decided to bake a traditional English cake. Well, you need a cake for every b'day, especially your queen's b'day.
This cake was a traditional autumnal cake from the country of Gloucester shire in England. Gloucester shire is very famous for it's apples, pear and plums.The local cheese: the double Gloucester, has also been made in Gloucester shire since the 16th century and was traditionally made from milk produced by Old Gloucester cattle. It is a hard, pale orangey cheese with a creamy, almost buttery, nutty flavor and a flaky texture. Hence, the Gloucester cake, was made from the locally produced apples and cheese. I have never eaten a cake made from hard cheeses, and was very eager to try when I first read about this cake from NQN. I was lucky enough to lay my hand on some quality double Gloucester, but like NQN, i also make it with pear instead of apple because I love the juicy and sweet Corella pears.
Double Gloucester Cheese Cake with Corella Pears
Ingredients:
- 225g Corella Pears, ( about 3-4 small sized pears )
- 120g Butter, soften
- 180g Caster sugar
- 2 Eggs
- 120g Double Gloucester, grated
- 450g Plain Flour
- 1/2 tsp bicarb soda
- 2 tsp Baking powder
- 3 tbsp yoghurt
- 60g flaked almonds
- Preheat the oven to 180 degree Celsius, line and grease a large loaf pan with grease proof paper.
- Grate the pear, retain all skin and juices
- With an electric mixer, cream together the butter, sugar and eggs.
- Sift together the flour, bicarb soda and baking powder
- Combine the dry ingredients into the wet ingredient, stir in the pear, cheese, and yoghurt. If the mixture appear to little too dry, add a dash of milk.
- Pour the mixture into the prepared tin, sprinkle the flaked almond on top.
- Bake in preheated oven for about 1 hour. Rest in the pan for about 5 mins before turning out onto wire rack to cool down further.
I like to serve the cake warm, straight from the oven, with a glass of cold chardonnay.
Oh, I'm not too sure if the Queen is truely happy on her birthday, but I sure am!!
2 comments:
That looks lovely and I like the sprinkling of flaked almonds on top and the styling :)
Oh thanks you. I actually forgot to put the almond until the very last mins, so just sprinkle them on top instead. haha!!
Post a Comment