My Daring Bakers Quick Bread and the True Purpose of Oscars Night

Much like with Super Bowl, Oscars night for me is an excuse to make fun food and get together with friends to drink too much on a Sunday night.  Holly and I were noticing a theme… we’ve always drunk by the time the actual show starts and rarely stay awake long enough to see who wins best picture.  But who cares, the red carpet is the real draw anyways.  I’m pretty sure that our mindset pretty accurately reflects that of most of the celebrities at the Academy Awards, except that our drug of choice is cheese.  Regardless, we got dressed up and enjoyed ourselves.

The party was also excellently timed with the unveiling of my February creation for Daring Bakers.  This month’s challenge, my first, was a quick bread.  The only rules were no yeast, must take less than an hour and a half to make and must be in loaf of muffin form.  I prefer savory breads to sweet and this recipe for goat cheese olive quick bread looked delicious.  I have to say I was quite pleased.  The bread was very moist, awesomely cheesy, and the sage was an excellent addition.

Savory Quick Bread with Goat Cheese, Olives and Sage

from Gastronomy

• Butter or bacon fat or preparing the pan
• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 2 teaspoon chili powder
• 1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
• 4 large eggs, room temperature
• 1/4 cup very fruity olive oil
• 1/2 cup plain whole-milk Greek yogurt
• 1/4 cup scallions, chopped
• 2 tbsp fresh sage, chopped
• 6 oz well-crumbled goat cheese
• 2 oz grated Parmesan
• 1/4 cup finely chopped pitted black olives

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9-inch loaf pan with bacon grease or butter and line the bottom with a piece of parchment paper.
2. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, chili powder, and salt.
3. In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs, olive oil, yogurt, scallions and sage until smooth.
4. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and use a rubber spatula to stir in the wet mixture, stirring just until the wet ingredients are almost incorporated. (A bit of flour should still be visible.) Don’t overmix.
   
5. Fold in the goat cheese, Parmesan, and olives until everything is just moistened. Scrape the batter into the prepared loaf pan.
   
6. Bake for 50 to 60 minutes, until the top is golden brown and the cake springs back when you gently touch the center. Let the cake cool for 5 minutes, then tilt it out onto a wire cooling rack. Peel off the parchment paper and let cool upright before slicing.

Johanna