5/20

Kitchen Experiments: Peekaboo Bread

Uncategorized
By A Beautiful Mess

Raspberry pound cake loafI've been wanting to try out a peekaboo bread for sometime now. I think the first time I saw one was last fall. It was a beautiful pumpkin bread with a pumpkin cut out in the center. You can probably guess what peekaboo bread is just from the name. Basically you hide a different kind of quick bread or pound cake in the center of another cake. You get to blend the flavors and create a cute design. I decided to give it a try.Berry bread with cut outsFirst I worked on a raspberry quick bread recipe that I liked. I baked one without any cut outs first, and it was yummy. I'm pretty partial to raspberries—love the flavor and the vibrant red color. 

Raspberry Quick Bread, makes one loaf.

5 1/2 tablespoons softened butter
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 3/4 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
12 ounces fresh raspberriesHow to make bread cut outsCream together the butter and sugar. Stir in the eggs and vanilla extract. In another bowl whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt and baking powder. Stir the flour mixture in with the butter mixture. In another bowl mash up the raspberries. Stir the raspberries and their juices in to the batter.

If you want to add cut outs here's what I did: Cut a store-bought pound cake in half lengthwise. Use a cookie cutter to cut out shapes (like stars). Fill a buttered loaf pan with a little bit of the raspberry bread batter. Now place the cut out stars upright in the pan. Fill around the stars with the remaining batter, being sure to cover the tops of the cut out shapes.* Bake at 350°F for 45-48 minutes.

*Try to choose a cut out shape that is not too large, or tall. If the shape reaches above your batter it may not look the best. This happened with my first loaf. 

I also noticed that the color of my outer loaf changed based on how close it was to the center cutouts. My guess is that the cut outs, while cute, do allow for some uneven cooking within the bread batter. Maybe that explains it, maybe not. I'm not really much of a food scientist, just a curious home baker.Raspberry quick breadWhat about you? Have you ever tried making peekaboo bread (or cake)? What other kitchen experiments have you been up to lately? xo. Emma

121 Comments

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.