Farewell Stu - baked lemon cheesecake

Baked cheesecake
Originally uploaded by Cakelaw

One of the people in my section at work leaves us tomorrow - well, sort of. After 2 years, he is taking up a new role in another group in the company, so this Friday's choice of baked goods has been selected by the man himself.

The request was for "lemon cheesecake". I am unsure whether this meant baked or unbaked cheesecake, so I have decided to make baked cheesecake, as it is just that little bit harder to make, and therefore more "special" in my eyes.

When I searched for suitable recipes, I found that many baked cheesecakes follow roughly the same formula, with minor variations here and there. Accordingly, this cheesecake is not made from any one recipe - I used my research to make a cheesecake that suited my fancy at the time, although any of the other variations would have made just as fine a finished product.

Even though the cheesecake turned out beautifully, with no cracks in the top, I decided to top it with a sour cream glaze, and once cooled, to sprinkle it with grated white chocolate. As you can see from the picture, the end result does not make a very tall cheesecake (even though I used the pan size called for in the filling recipe); however, it appears to have turned out well.

The recipe is as follows:

Base

150g plain sweet biscuits, finely crushed

100g melted butter or margarine

Preheat oven to 160 degrees Celcius.

Mix crushed biscuits and butter together in a bowl, then press into a 20cm springform that has been greased and lined with baking paper. Refrigerate for 10-15 minutes.

Filling

500g cream cheese (I used light Philadelphia cream cheese)

150g ricotta cheese

1/2 cup sugar

2 tablespoons plain flour

2 lightly beaten eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

1 tablespoon lemon juice

2 teaspoons grated lemon zest (optional - I left it out because some people do not like zest)

1/4 teaspoon salt

Beat together the two cheeses until smooth and creamy. It helps to get a smoother result if you chop the cheeses into rough cubes before beating. Combine the sugar, flour and salt in a small bowl, and beat half of this mixture into the cheeses. Add the eggs, vanilla and lemon juice (and zest) and beat well. Finally, beat in the remaining sugar mixture.

Pour the filling onto the biscuit base, then bake in the oven for 45-50 minutes until set. Take cheesecake out of the oven and turn up the temperature to 200 degrees Celcius.

Topping

300ml carton sour cream (I used light sour cream)

2 tablespoons sugar

1 tablespoon lemon juice

Beat together the sour cream, sugar and lemon juice. Spread evenly over the top of the cheesecake. Return the cheesecake to the oven for 5 minutes to set the topping, then switch off the oven and leave the cheesecake to cool inside it for one hour. After this time, remove the cheesecake from the oven and leave to cool completely on the bench. Once the cheesecake is cool, refrigerate overnight. Just prior to serving, remove the cheesecake from the springform pan, and grate white chocolate over the top of the cheesecake (optional).

This cheesecake had a lovely, smooth texture, and did not taste "eggy". It also did not taste very lemony! If I made this again as a lemon flavoured cheesecake (as opposed to wanting just cheesecake), I would add the zest and up the lemon juice. However, despite my fears about the uptake of this cheesecake, it went down well with my work colleagues, and none was left at the end of the day (no mean feat given that we only served it at 4.30pm). Another work colleague made a lovely strawberry refrigerator cheesecake for the occasion, so all tastes were catered for on the day.