Margaret's Quark Stollen (Cottage Cheese Stollen)

This is an old German recipe. I put the conversion in parenthesis ( ). If you can weigh the ingredients it is a good idea to do so because weighing is the most accurate way to measure baking ingredients. Think about this, if you measure cups of flour, it can be variable depending on if the flour is packed down or not. There are also measuring cups with grams, sold in most cooking specialty stores. They are cone shaped and so easy to use.

Here is a really yummy recipe. No one would ever guess the ingredient of cottage cheese.

1 lb. (4 cups) flour
2 eggs
200 gr (7 oz) sugar
250 gr (9 oz) butter
2 T. rum extract
200 gr. (7 oz) raisins
250 gr. (9 oz) cottage cheese, NOT creamed.
1 tsp. grated lemon rind
1/4 lb. (1 cup) finely grated almonds
100 gr. (3.5 oz) candied fruits
4 level tsps. baking powder

Cream the butter and sugar, then add the eggs. Strain cottage cheese until most of liquid is removed. Press cottage cheese through a sieve to make it smooth. (I used a food processor, zapped it 2 or 3 times) Add cottage cheese to butter mixture. Add rum extract and lemon rind. Mix well. Mix flour and baking powder together. Add to above mixture. Knead dough until your hands are clean (not sticky). Coat almonds and fruits with a tsp. of flour. Add to dough and knead well to mix in fruit.
Split dough into two parts. Flatten dough for each loaf. Should be an oval shape. Melt a table spoon of butter and brush on top of each piece. Fold each piece in half and place on lightly greased cookie sheet. Bake one hour at 350 degrees.

Allow to cool. Can be coated with confectioners' sugar when completely cooled. Or you can make a glaze with confectioners' sugar and lemon juice.