It's World Baking Day today (thank goodness for Twitter, which is letting me know about such incredibly important things) so I'll share a recipe with you. It's not a classical cake, but can be eaten as a dessert: Quarkauflauf (curd cheese casserole). Basically, this is rather close to a crustless cheesecake.

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There you go: Curd Cheese Casserole, fresh out of the oven, with cherries on top.


I remember this being an occasional sweet lunch when I was small. It was only occasional partly because sweet lunches were just not the rule, and partly because my dad is no fan of curd cheese, and didn't much like this as a meal. All of us had some meals we weren't too fond of, and these would thus be only very occasional - so that nobody had to suffer too much under the taste preferences of the rest of the family.After I moved out from home, I more or less forgot about this dish - until I rediscovered it a while ago, when I was looking for something to do with a leftover pack of curd cheese. This time around, I completely fell in love with the stuff, as it can be eaten hot or cold, it freezes well, goes with a lot of different kinds of fruit, and is quick and easy to make.

• 2 eggs
• 250 g curd cheese
• one tablespoon starch or about 30 g protein powder (neutral)
• about 50 g sugar (or less, if you prefer it less sweet - I use about 20 g of unrefined sugar, as the fruit delivers enough sweetness for my taste buds, and I like the taste the unrefined stuff brings into the mix)
• one teaspoon baking powder
• 200-300 g of fruit (tangerine, apple, cherry or plum all work beautifully for this)

Put everything except the fruit into a bowl and mix to a creamy consistency. Place into a suitable casserole or several smaller forms; I split this mix into 3 small oven-safe glass forms. Add the fruit of your choice either on top of the mix, or layer it between two layers of the curd mixture.

Bake for about 15-30 min at c. 170°C (fan oven) depending on your oven and the form(s) you filled it into; it should still be moist on the inside, but golden on the outside.

(If you are wondering about the protein powder substitution - I'm still getting rid of excess weight, and this is a relatively easy way for me to get enough protein per day.)

Happy World Baking Day!