Sernik Krakowski

Ingredients

• 300 g plain flour
• 100 g icing sugar
• 180 g cold butter
• 2 egg yolks for the pastry
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 2 tbsp soured cream
• 1 kg full-fat twaróg
• 200 g caster sugar
• 5 eggs
• 120 g softened butter
• 60 g potato starch
• 100 g raisins
• 3 tbsp dark rum
• 60 g candied orange peel
• zest of 1 lemon
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 120 g icing sugar for the glaze
• 2 tbsp lemon juice

Before you cook

• Soak the raisins in the rum for thirty minutes.
• Grind the twaróg twice through the fine plate of a mincer.
• Take the filling butter out of the fridge to soften.
• Separate the five eggs into two bowls.
• Line a 24 cm square tin with baking paper.

Steps

1. Rub the cold butter into the flour, icing sugar and baking powder until it looks like coarse crumbs.
2. Add the two pastry egg yolks and the soured cream.
3. Bring the pastry together quickly with your hands without kneading it.
4. Cut off a third of the pastry and wrap it separately.
5. Chill both pieces for thirty minutes.
6. Heat the oven to 180°C.
7. Press the larger piece of pastry evenly over the base of the lined tin.
8. Prick the base all over with a fork.
9. Bake the base for fifteen minutes until pale gold.
10. Set the base aside to cool.
11. Beat the softened butter with the caster sugar for five minutes until pale and fluffy.
12. Beat in the five egg yolks one at a time.
13. Add the ground twaróg in three additions, beating well after each.
14. Fold in the potato starch, lemon zest and vanilla.
15. Drain the raisins and fold them in with the candied peel.
16. Whisk the five egg whites to soft peaks in a clean bowl.
17. Fold the whites into the cheese mixture in three additions.
18. Spread the filling over the cooled base and level the top.
19. Roll the reserved pastry out and cut it into 1 cm strips.
20. Lay the strips over the filling in a lattice.
21. Bake for one hour until the filling is set with only a slight wobble at the centre.
22. Turn the oven off and leave the cake inside with the door ajar for thirty minutes.
23. Cool the cake completely in the tin.
24. Beat the glaze icing sugar with the lemon juice into a pourable glaze.
25. Drizzle the glaze over the lattice and let it set before slicing.