Basque Cheesecake

 

Creamy, probably the best cheesecake I've eaten recently. Also, probably the easiest to make, and the most provocative looking cheesecake with it's burnt top. It was actually it's burnt top that caught my eye in the 2020 July Food and Wine, our family tends to like the burnt bits :). I decided to translate it to real measurements, but I'll share the cups and spoons, too, if that's what you prefer.

Ingredient

1 kg (36 Oz) cream cheese

300 g sugar (1 2/3 cup)  

6 large eggs

1 egg yolk

450 ml (2 cups)  heavy whipping cream

50 g (3 tbsp) flour

1 tbsp vanilla extract

Serving

some sour berry or sour cherry fruit compote.

Preheat the oven to 230C (450F). Line a 10" springform pan with 2 piece of parchment paper to overlap at the bottom, and overhang by about 5 cm (2").

In a mixing bowl combine well cream cheese and sugar until creamy using the paddle attachment.

Start slowly, and increase the speed, beating it for about 5 minutes.

Whisk together the heavy cream and the flower in a medium bowl, and slowly incorporate it into the cream cheese mixture.

Add the eggs + egg yolk one at a time, beating them in at medium speed until well combined.

Add the vanilla on low speed until well blended.

Pour the mixture into the springform.

Bake for 30-35 minutes, until the top is dark brown and the middle is still very wobbly.

 

Remove from the oven and let it chill on the counter for 3 hours (some residual cooking will happen from the heat), and in the fridge for another 4.

I recorded it with the wobble wobble :D, just for fun.

Before serving remove from the fridge and let it sit at room temperature for about 30 min.

Enjoy!

Mango-lemon cheesake

Mangose, mangoes, mangoes.. And most of them are ripe and yammi, so what to do on a hot day between a visit to the Safari and dinner with friends better than.. well, baking is probably not the best idea, but thankfully with air conditioning everything is possible.
To make the sweetness more barelable I used lemons, mainly because they grow in my yard, but you can replace it with lime for a more characteristic taste.

Ingredients

Bottom
8 graham crackers
75 g coconut oil (about 6 tbsp) or butter (3/4 stick)
1 tsp  sugar (optional)

Cream cheese - mango layer 
500 ml (2 cups) mango pure - obtained from 3 large mangoes
900 gr, 32 ounces of cream cheese (corrected! my mistake, I miscalculated the weight before..)
200 gr sugar (1 cup)
3 eggs + 2 yolks
1 tsp lemon zest (or lime zest), optional

Lemon layer
250 ml (1 cup) sour cream
2 tbsp lemon juice
1 tbsp sugar

Prepare a 9"-10" round cake pen, by greasing lighlty the sides with butter.
Preheat the oven to 160 C, 325 F.
Crumble the crackers, mix with the butter butter and press tightly into the cake form. I used a ziploc to cramble the crackers, but a food processor might speed up your work.
Use the botton of your cup measure to press the crackers evenly in the bottom, and the sides of the form.
In a food processor puree the mango.
Blend the cream cheese with the sugar, add the mangoe pure and the lime yest.
Blend in the eggs one by one, starting with the yolks, incorporating each egg before adding the next.
Reserve some mango pure for decoration.
Pour over the cracker layer and bake at 160C (325F) for 1 hour 15 minutes.
Meanwhile mix the sour cream with the sugar and lemon juice, remove the cake from the oven and spread the sour cream mix over the cream cheese layer.
Add small teaspoons of mango pure in rows or randomly, as many as you please and find virtually appealing.
With the thicked end of a chopstik "cut" through the middle of the dots to create hearts :).
Bake for additional 10 minutes.
Remove from the oven, let it cool, and refrigerate uncovered overnight, or at least 4 hours.

Bon appetit!

Upps.. Sorry. I couldn't find the bottom of my cake form in the mess and hurry, so I used a half size foil pan, I'm sure you can do better :D.

Cream cheese - cranberry muffin

Muffins are new to the Hungarian/Finnish culinary scene.
Some of them are horrible, and I mist say to me is till a mystery how can people eat those full of butter frosting monsters one can encounter basically everywhere here.
There are a few exceptions, though, especially the home made ones. Our first success was a triple chocolate, recipe lost, but desperately looking for it..
To soothe the pain meanwhile, faith sent us  cranberry muffins made by a friend, and they were so good that they were gone in no time, so I obviously begged for the recipe.
I made slight changes to it, khhhhmmm... of course. The main reason is that the amount of sugar looked faaar to big for my European stomach. Second, because I had some shredded coconut I didn't know what to do with, so I had to make a good use for it in these muffins..
For me the cranberry is somehow associated with Xmas, but I had no kitchen back then, so here you go, cranberry dessert that's going to fill our NEXT Xmas table, but meanwhile our pockets on these beatiful and cool spring days :)

Ingredients (makes 24 normal size, 48 mini muffins)
1 cup butter, softened
8 oz cream cheese
1 cup sugar (original recipe called for 1 1/2 cups)
1 1 /2 tsp vanilla
4 large eggs
2 cups all purpose flour (whole wheat flour would work great, too, if not better)
1 1 /2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups fresh (or frozen) cranberries
1/2 cup shredded coconut (original recipe called for chopped cashew nuts, to be tried next)

Preheat oven to 350F. Place 24 baking  cups in a tray and lightly spray them with oil.
Mix butter with sugar, mix in the cream cheese, and at the end mix in the eggs, one by one, mixing each well in before adding the next one.
Mix flour with salt and baking powder, lightly mix in the dry ingredients in the butter-cram cheese mixture. Don't overmix, just to have it kinda evened.
Fold in the fresh or frozen cranberries and coconut.
Scoop batter in the baking cups. I had some mini cups, so I got about 36 of them 3/4th full of batter.
Bake for 20/25 minutes. Let them cool a tiny bit, at least 5 minutes, than remove them to a serving plate.
They are a yummi and healthy-ish snack/dessert for the kids for school, or for you to enjoy.
Bon appetite!

Obs. Minimuffins need to be baked at 380F, and for shorter, like 15-18 min time. I managed to overbake them, slightly, so leave them lighter in color for a tiny bit more moist texture.

Spinach - cream cheese soup

I bought for the tort Milanese one extra bunch of fresh spinach which was already cooked, waiting for ... something. Not to mention the big bunch of chives left unused. The amount was too small to make anything proper with spinach, but felt sorry for throwing it away. Faith (there are no coincidences :D) made me lift an old Koti&Keittiö from the shelf to relax before going to bed, and I found a soup..
Well, I found almost this soup, but I changed some spices to reflect the Hungarian taste or nobody would bother eating it in the family. In addition, the recipe was calling for feta cheese, but I had only cream cheese in the fridge.
Here is what I came up with, an almost Hungarian spinach soup, with less spinach and cream cheese.

Ingredients (makes 4-6 portions, ready in ~40 min)
300 g fresh spinach, about 1 large bunch
2 tbsp butter
3 tbsp white flour
1 l milk
1 tsp salt
1 clove(s) garlic, very finely chopped, optional :)
pinch of black pepper
pinch of nutmeg
150 g cream cheese (I added ~6 tbsp cream cheese)
1/2 small bunch of chives (1 large tbsp chopped chives)
1 tbsp fresh chopped Italian parsley

If you ask me, this asks for a dash (or two) of white wine :). I like creamy soups with vinegar or lemon zest, but this soup somehow didn't ask for neither of them but rather a little bit of dry white wine. I added about 50 ml. You decide how you like it, this is absolutely optional.

Serving
fresh bread, croutons, toasted bread cubes

Rinse the spinach and in a small pot with boiling water boil them for about 5 min. Drain, chop it a bit finer.
In a larger (2 litres) pot melt the butter, saute the garlic (if any) for some seconds, add the flour and fry until gets a very light golden color. Basically make a so called rántás. Poor in the milk mixing continuously, and cook it until the top starts bubbling.
Add the spinach, chives, spices and cream cheese, and boil it together for additional 10 minutes.
I mixed the cream cheese in a bowl with some soup until became smooth before adding it to the soup, just to make sure I won't have bigger cheese balls left.
Adjust thickness with extra water if wished. Adjust saltiness with the 1 tsp salt, or as much you feel is needed.
Serve with some fresh bread, or toasted bread cubes.