Hi Rose and fellow-bakers,

First I want to say I’m huge fan of you, Rose. I have all 3 bibles and love all the recipes I’ve tried so far.

I will be traveling to Europe next month to visit family. I always bake when I’m there. I was wondering if I could replace the cream cheese in my recipes with quark and/or fromage blanc? It’s hard to get Philadelphia cream cheese over there. I’m thinking of making cream cheese frosting, cheesecake, etc.

Thanks,
Hanaa

Hanaa - where are you from?  I have a friend here in the US who is from The Netherlands.  She wishes she could find quark.  She said it is very similar to cream cheese, so I think the answer would be yes.  (fyi - I googled quark and found a recipe to make your own).

Hi Patrincia,

What a coincidence. I’m from the Netherlands too. I looked for quark in the US for a long time too but couldn’t find it either. Found only a couple recipes that are doable in the home kitchen where you don’t need temperature controlled rooms, etc In Europe, quark is often used to make no-bake “cheesecake”-like baked goods with a cookie crust. Gelatin is always used for those types of cakes.

I will definitely try using the same amount of quark (by weight) for the cream cheese. I was just wondering if anyone had tried that already and what their experience was.

Thanks again,
Hanaa

Okay… is Hanaa your real name???

My friend Anja was looking for the quark to make a no-bake cheesecake too!!!  She ended up using the “make your own” version and said it was better than nothing, but still not exactly the same as quark.

Yeah, I’ve used cream cheese in the European-style no-bake cheesecake recipe but it didn’t taste the same as it does with quark. In Rick Rodgers’ book Kaffeehaus, he mentions using plain yogurt. I was thinking of trying that sometime but I would definitely drain it in a cheesecloth for a couple hours or so to drain excess wey.

If anyone else has any thoughts/experiences on the subject, I would appreciate it.

Thanks!

I’ve got no idea, but thought I’d mention that another blog I check in on currently has a recipe for Quark ice cream. Just thought I’d mention it, in case you hadn’t seen it.

ILoveBaking - 21 November 2007 06:31 PM

Hi Rose and fellow-bakers,

First I want to say I’m huge fan of you, Rose. I have all 3 bibles and love all the recipes I’ve tried so far.

I will be traveling to Europe next month to visit family. I always bake when I’m there. I was wondering if I could replace the cream cheese in my recipes with quark and/or fromage blanc? It’s hard to get Philadelphia cream cheese over there. I’m thinking of making cream cheese frosting, cheesecake, etc.

Thanks,
Hanaa

It is funny you are asking this because I was just reading the following post last night:

http://www.davidlebovitz.com/archives/2006/02/american_baking.html

There are a couple of suggestions for finding cream cheese.  Where will you be in Europe?

Matthew,

Thanks for that link. That’s a good one (I always bring things such as corn syrup with me, now I might not have to).
I will be visiting in the Netherlands. Quark and fromage blanc are so readily available there that I think I’ll just give it a shot and see what happens.

This quark is obviously something different than the quarks in physics, but I have no idea what it is. I’ll guess that it’s a “yogurt cheese”, maybe, made by draining yogurt?

I can find Quark (made by the Vermont Cheese Company) here in Denver, Co at my local Whole Foods. I have also found that some smaller, local diary creameries (especially in the New England area) make it as well.