No-bake Mango Cheesecake

Tonight’s dessert is a delicious no-bake mango cheesecake. We originally got this recipe from the label of a Nestle condensed milk tin, and have been making it for decades. It is a no- bake cheesecake, which is simple to make and creamy to eat.

To make this cheesecake, you will need:

1/2 of a 250g packet Arnotts Chocolate Ripple Biscuits

50g melted butter

500g cream cheese

395g can condensed milk

425g can mango slices in syrup, drained

Juice of 1 lemon

2 tablespoons gelatine

Hot water

 Line the base and sides of a 9” springform pan with baking paper. Leave the cream cheese out of the fridge to soften. 

Crush the biscuits until fine either in a food processor or using the end of a rolling pin.

Melt the butter, then pour it over the biscuit crumbs and mix well. Press the biscuit crumb mixture over the base of the springform pan and refrigerate while you make the filling. 

Cut the cream cheese into small cubes. Put the cubed cream cheese into a bowl and, using a hand mixer or stand mixer, mix the cream cheese until smooth. 

Pour the condensed milk into the cream cheese and mix until well combined. Puree the mango slices in a blender or food processor, and mix the puree through the cream cheese mixture. Mix the gelatine with just enough hot water to liquify it, then mix it and the lemon juice through the cream cheese mixture. 

Pour the cream cheese mixture over the chilled biscuit base, then return the cheesecake to the fridge to set (4 hours or overnight).

Unclip the springform tin and slice the cheesecake to serve. You can serve the cheesecake with cream or icecream, and you can decorate it with extra fruit.

TWD - Marbled Cheesecake

 This week’s Tuesday with Dorie recipe is Marbled Cheesecake. The cheesecake is a combination of vanilla and chocolate, with a biscuit base.

The cheesecake is a traditional baked cheesecake, baked in a waterbath in the oven.

The recipe made a massive cheesecake, with nearly a kilo of cream cheese in the filling. I halved the filling, which made a more manageable and economical cheesecake.

The chocolate cheesecake batter is made by combining a chocolate and coffee syrup mixture with a third of the vanilla batter.

I used Malt O Milk biscuits for my cheesecake’s biscuit base.

As a cheesecake lover, I enjoyed this tasty dessert.

To see what everyone else made this week, visit the LYL section of the TWD website.

TWD - Strawberry Cheesecake-Chocolate No-Bake Pie

 This week’s Tuesday with Dorie recipe is Strawberry Cheesecake-Chocolate No-Bake Pie (phew, quite a mouthful).

For me, the “no bake” part wasn’t quite true as I opted to bake a chocolate crust for my pie. 

The pie crust (which can be made with crushed biscuits for the “no bake” option) is lined with ganache, then halved fresh strawberries, then covered with a white chocolate cheesecake filling.

I made the ganache using chocolate and Greek yoghurt instead of cream. I still had to buy cream to whip for the filling (darn it!), but replaced the sour cream with more Greek yoghurt . It worked a treat.

I had to buy cream, cream cheese and white chocolate to make this pie, which made it an expensive recipe despite my use of yoghurt that I already had and making the pie crust instead of using crushed biscuits. For this reason, although the end product is tasty, it will not be returning in my house.

To see what everyone else made this week and their views on it, visit the LYL section of the TWD website.

Berry Ricotta Baked Cheesecake

 

Cheesecake is one of our family's favourite desserts, so while I was on vacation with my mother, she hankered after a berry cheesecake.  Mum had seen a raspberry baked cheesecake on Good Chef Bad Chef, so I found the recipe online here. 

The recipe creates a vast cheesecake, so I halved it, which still created a very nice sized cheesecake.  We also used frozen mixed berries instead of fresh raspberries.

I really liked this cheesecake.  The mixture of ricotta and cream cheese makes for a cheesecake that is less dense than its all-cream cheese counterparts, and the digestive biscuit base gives it a nice earthy flavour.

To make this cheesecake (half size), you will need:

Base

150g digestive biscuits

50g softened butter

15g brown sugar  

Cheesecake

250g cream cheese

375g ricotta

125g sugar

2 1/2 large eggs

1 tablespoon lemon zest

250g berries, fresh or frozen

pinch of salt

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius and grease and line an 8" round springform tin.

Process the biscuits, butter and brown sugar together in a food processor until crumbs form.  (Interestingly, there is no need to melt the butter - I will use this technique again.) Scrape the crumb mixture into the prepared springform tin, and spread out evenly, pressing into the tin to create a flat base for the cheesecake. (I think your fingers work just as well as anything for this purpose.) Place into the fridge to chill while you make the filling.

Put the cheeses, eggs, lemon zest and sugar into a food processor  and process until smooth.  Remove the bowl from the food processor, take out the blade, and gently fold through the berries with a spatula.

Pour the cheesecake mixture over the chilled base, and bake the cheesecake in the oven for 40 minutes or until cooked through (ie firm to the touch on top but still a bit jiggly).  Mine took ~ 50 minutes.  You can turn off the oven and leave the door slightly ajar with a wooden spoon, leaving the cheesecake to cool in the oven.  However, I just removed the cheesecake from the oven immediately and left it to cool on a rack without any ill effect.

Once cool, chill the cheesecake in the fridge for at least a couple of hours or overnight to allow the flavours to meld and the texture to smooth before slicing and serving.     

Lemon and poppy seed meringue cheesecake

My mum has sent me some very nice recipes out of her local paper recently.  One that particularly caught my eye was for a lemon and poppy seed meringue cheesecake, by Phoebe Wood.  

Unfortunately, my circumstances mean that it was not realistic to make the whole cheesecake.  Instead, I quartered the recipe, and made two 6" tart versions.  They are not as visually stunning as the whole cheesecake, but they tasted great.

The cheesecake is comprised of a pastry base, with a lemon curd and poppy seed flavoured filling, and topped with sour cream and meringue.  The meringue was also meant to contain poppy seeds, but I forgot. 

I think the mini tarts are cute:

 To make this cheesecake (full recipe), you will need:

Pastry

1 cup plain flour
1/4 cup sugar
75g butter, chopped

Filling

150g sugar

350g cream cheese, at room temperature and cut into cubes

350g ricotta 

200g lemon curd (I used this Donna Hay recipe to make some)

3 eggs

1 tablespoon poppy seeds

180g white chocolate, melted and cooled

200g sour cream (I used Greek yoghurt)

Meringue

3 egg whites

3/4 cup sugar

3 teaspoons poppy seeds

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius and grease a 22cm springform pan

To make the pastry, put the flour and sugar into a food processor and blitz to combine.  Add the butter, and blitz until crumbs form.  Add 2 tablespoons or so of cold water, a little at a time, until the dough just comes together.    Press the pastry into the base of the prepared springform pan.  Put a few prick marks in the pastry with the tines of a fork. Line the pastry with a piece of alfoil, shiny side down, and cover with baking beans or rice.   Bake for 25 minutes in the preheated oven, then remove the baking beans and foil, and bake for a further 5-10 minutes or until the pastry is golden.  Remove it from the oven and allow it to cool.

Reduce the heat of the oven to 150 degrees Celsius.  In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the cream cheese until smooth.  Slowly beat in the sugar, then beat in the ricotta and lemon curd until smooth.    Beat in 2 eggs and the poppy seeds until combined, then pour the mixture over the cooled pastry base.  Bake for 1 hour or until just set with a slight wobble in the centre.

Whisk the melted chocolate, sour cream and remaining egg together in a bowl until smooth.  Pour it over the top of the baked cheesecake, and bake the cheesecake for a further 10 minutes.  Turn off the oven, leaving the cheesecake inside and the door slightly ajar, until the cheesecake cools completely. 

Remove the cooled cheesecake form the oven and chill in the fridge for at least 4 hours.

For the meringue, put the eggwhites and sugar in a heatproof bowl and set over a pan of just simmering water, whisking by hand until the sugar dissolves.  Remove the bowl from the heat, and beat with a handmixer until the meringue is thick, glossy and completely cooled.  Whisk in the poppy seeds, then transfer it to a piping bag fitted with a 7cm plain nozzle and pipe in a spiral over the top of the cheesecake, piping form the centre outwards.

Using a kitchen blowtorch, brown the top of the meringue.  Serve immediately or chill the cheesecake in the fridge until needed.