Whole Wheat Blackberry Cream Cheese Swirl Bread with Vanilla Bean Glaze
Whole wheat bread swirled with homemade blackberry jam and a rich cream cheese swirl, drizzled with sweet vanilla bean glaze!
Lately I’m all about scaring myself, it seems.
For my most recent post, I made jam. The kind you have to sterilize jars for, and put in a water bath. (!)
And now, here I am baking bread. (!)
But it’s all good. I mean, it’s working out fine. The jam came out amazing, nice and thick and like a super-intense, sweet blackberry flavor bomb. And the jars all sealed! The whole business only took an hour or so, and most of that time was spent running the fruit through a sieve to get the seeds out.
I will never fear jam again. In fact, I’m embracing it. I totally want to do it again! It’s fun! (<–Yes, I am kind of a dork…)
Bread has always been a little scary for me. I mean, I’m not totally afraid of yeast. I do make pizza dough. And cinnamon rolls. They are always good. But the one time I took a crack at actual BREAD-bread, the results left a bit to be desired.
But I just couldn’t get the idea of freshly baked homemade bread swirled with cream cheese and blackberry jam outta my head.
Let’s conquer our fears!
I really wish I had taken better photos for this post, because these pics do not do justice. Hindsight’s always 20/20, and I’m kicking myself for not taking an extra minute to check a few test shots on the computer screen and bump up the iso. No amount of editing can turn a bad photo good, and hopefully I won’t forget that lesson again. >:(
Anyhow, this bread is even SO much better than I thought it would be. I totally did a double-take when I tasted it!
It bakes up super fluffy, soft, and moist, with a little bit of a nutty texture from the whole wheat flour. And the dough’s so easy to work with. You don’t even need to sprinkle the work surface with flour! It comes together in a snap, with most of the prep time indicated in the recipe being rise time, which is completely hands-off. And that blackberry cream cheese swirl! Omg, heaven! The vanilla bean glaze just takes the whole thing to another level. It’s a little detail but it adds so much!
Mix up the dough and pop it in a greased bowl. Set it in a warm place to rise for an hour.
Roll it out to a rectangle shape, about 9 inches on the short side, and 1/4 inch thick. Spread on a thick layer of seedless blackberry jam, and then layer the cheesecakey goodness on top.
Carefully roll it up like a log, just like if you were making cinnamon rolls…
…and plop it into a greased loaf pan. Another hour to rise, and then bake it up all puffy and golden!
Once it’s cooled, it gets drizzled with the most intensely aromatic vanilla bean glaze…
It’s just the perfect touch of sweetness against the nutty whole wheat bread, the tart blackberry jam, and the rich cheesecake.
Baking this up while the kids are busy at school is definitely the right move. You’re going to want to get right on that.
Your whole house will smell amazing (hi, fresh baked bread), and it makes THE most perfect breakfast on-the-go for busy mornings. I mean, even easier than toast, friends! You don’t even have to spread anything on it.
It’s all right there!
How do you do with bread? Does it scare you a little bit? Canning jam? Or is it something else that freaks the bejesus out of you? What motivates you to conquer your food fears?
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Whole Wheat Blackberry Cream Cheese Swirl Bread with Vanilla Bean Glaze
Ingredients
For the Bread:
- 1 1/4 cups (156.25 g) all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup (60 g) whole wheat flour
- 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 1/4 ounce (7.09 g) dry active yeast, (1 packet)
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- 1/3 cup (78.86 ml) milk, (I used almond milk, but any kind would work), lukewarm
- 1 egg, (large)
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter,, softened
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
For the Filling:
- 8 ounces (226.8 g) cream cheese,, softened
- 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 1 egg yolk, (large)
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice, (juice of half a lemon)
- 1/8 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/2 cup (170 g) seedless blackberry jam
For the Vanilla Bean Glaze:
- 3/4 cup (90 g) powdered sugar
- 1 tablespoon water
- 1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste, (extract may be substituted)
Instructions
Make the Bread Dough:
- Place the first 5 (dry) ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Stir to combine.
- Add the remaining ingredients, and allow to knead (with the dough hook attachment) for 5 minutes.
- Transfer to a lightly greased bowl, cover, and let rise in a warm place until doubled in size (about 1 hour).
Make the Filling:
- Place the first 5 filling ingredients in a medium bowl. Stir until well combined.
Assemble the Bread:
- Roll the dough out, in a roughly rectangular shape, to about 9-inches on the short side, and about ¼-inch thick.
- Spread the surface with blackberry jam, leaving a ½-inch margin around the perimeter.
- Spread the cream cheese filling over the blackberry jam.
- Roll the dough up into a (short) log, and place in a lightly greased 9x5-inch loaf pan.
- Cover, and allow it to rise in a warm place until doubled in size (about one hour).
- Bake at 375 degrees F for 50 minutes, or until golden brown.
Make the Vanilla Bean Glaze:
- While the bread bakes, combine the vanilla bean glaze ingredients in a small bowl and whisk until smooth.
- Allow the bread to cool completely in the pan.
- Remove bread from the loaf pan and place on a wire cooling rack. Drizzle with the vanilla bean glaze.
Although it’s one of my all-time favorite places for breakfast food, I typically don’t get the opportunity to eat at Cracker Barrel more than a couple of times a year. No matter when I go, after eating there, I crave biscuits like mad.
After one visit in particular I had biscuits on the brain. Not just biscuits, though… I couldn’t get sausage gravy out of my head. So, I made it happen!
I used my favorite buttermilk biscuit recipe and an amped-up version of the sawmill gravy I made to go along with chicken-fried steak. The sausage gravy I made for these biscuits has a lot more sausage, is spiced up with some pepper and seasoned salt, and makes a much larger amount. Perfect for extra breakfast guests!
When I read this recipe I was surprised that it didn’t call for putting the yeast in warm water with sugar before adding it to anything. I figured I’d risk it and follow your recipe exactly, but my bread never rose! It still tasted great but was incredibly dense. Any idea why mine came out so differently? I used Active Dry Yeast, and I’ve successfully made bread before.
I’m so sorry you had trouble, Blair! I know I was surprised about that too when I read the recipe for the first time. I was following Brown Eyed Baker’s recipe here. I’m really not much of a bread baker so I was really relying heavily on her recipe. The only thing I can think of is maybe your yeast was dead? If you decide to try it again, maybe proof the yeast in the milk, adding the sugar, just to be sure before you put it in with the other ingredients. If it doesn’t get foamy looking after 5 or 10 minutes then it’s probably no good. Again, I’m so sorry! But thank you for reading!
Ok thanks! I realized I didn’t use lukewarm milk, which so might have been the problem. I’ll definitely try this again!
Oh ok! I hope that gives you a better result! Good luck and thanks again for reading, Blair! 😉
OMG! I want this now 🙂
Ha ha! Thanks, Jenn! It’s really good and so beautiful! Not that hard to make though… Thanks for stopping by and hope to see you here again!