Belgian Loaf (Tea Bread) - Dedicated to My grandmother

It had been some years since I last ate Belgian Loaf and to be honest, I've been putting off making it..

Belgian Loaf was something my grandmother made and I have lots of memories of visiting her and having this still warm from the oven or cold and slathered with salted butter thick enough you could see teeth marks in it. It's really good toasted too.

I have my grandmother's recipe book, which was very tattered and well used. Part of me has wanted to make this for some years now, but the other part wanted to keep it just as a memory. At a guess, it's been around 10 years since I last had a slice of this...

However, I also felt it fitting that Belgian Loaf should somewhere make an entry on my blog, and I think Gran would be proud if she was still with us.....

Belgian Loaf is a kind of sweet tea bread - sort of like a fruited sweet bread cross cake.

Recipe

1 cup of milk

1 cup of sugar

1 cup of raisins

4oz butter or margarine

2 cups of plain flour

1 beaten egg

1/2 tsp cream of tartar

1/2 tsp baking powder

Preheat oven to 180deg C fan

Pour milk, sugar, raisins and margarine / butter into a large pan and bring to the boil.

Leave to cool, then  add all sieved dry ingredients plus beaten egg and mix in well.

Cook in a greased and floured 2lb loaf tin or silicone loaf mould for about 50mins or until a skewer comes out clean

For once, it was a beautiful bright sunny day with beautiful blue skies. These old byplanes kept flying around from a nearby airfield.

Sarah-Jane Nash, July 2011 - www.siliconemoulds.com - silicone bakeware specialist cook shop