Cheese Glazed Coffee Cake

This is a difficult cake to describe. Basically, it is a shortbread crust with choux pastry baked atop it, glazed with a cream cheese frosting. Imagine a toad in the hole, meets a cream puff, crossed with glazed orange rolls, and a few generations later you get an underbaked popover. Yep, it is sort of like that.

We can't decide if we like it or not. The pastry is very buttery and rich, but has no sugar. The frosting is really sweet, which more than compensates for it. Maybe it is too sophisticated for us. I can see serving this as part of a larger breakfast, but as the sole meal with coffee, it was a bit lacking as you really can't fill up on it, even if you wanted to as it is so buttery.



(Here's a picture of Saturday's breakfast-potatoes, onions and green bell pepper topped with fried eggs, served with baked beans and a multi-grain sourdough toast. Grapefruit juice, coffee, tea and milk were also offered. Now, that is my idea of a proper breakfast).

*I just tore off a small piece after it had cooled completely-and I like it better. The filling has solidified, and seems less eggy. Who knows? I stuck the remainder in the fridge-we'll see if it ends up being like a cold pudding.

The recipe comes from Sunset Breads, Step by Step Techniques

You Will Need:

1 cup butter or margarine (I used butter)
2 cups Plain flour, divided
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons water, divided
4 large eggs
3/4 teaspoon almond extract (I used vanilla)
1/2 cup sliced almonds (I substituted a scattering of pearl sugar)

Cream Cheese Glaze:

3 ounces softened cream cheese
3/4 cup icing sugar
1 teaspoon grated orange zest
1 tablespoon orange juice

-Beat all until smooth.


Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
In a small bowl, cut 1/2 cup of butter into 1 cup of the flour. Add the 2 tablespoons of water and pat into a 10 inch round on an ungreased baking sheet.

In a large pot, heat the remaining water and butter cut into pieces. Bring to a boil. Remove from heat and with a wooden spoon, beat all of the flour in at once and beat until all flour is blended. Return pan to heat reduced to medium and beat until dough forms a heavy ball and clears the sides of the pot. Remove from heat and beat in the eggs, one at a time until well incorporated with each addition. Add extract. Spread mixture evenly over pastry.

Bake about 45 minutes or until top is puffed, browned, and looks crisp. Meanwhile, prepare the cream cheese glaze. Let cake cool 10 minutes, then drizzle with glaze and top with almonds or sugar. Cut into wedges and serve. Makes 10 servings.