September 01, 2015

'Lucky Cheesecake Number 7,' or, Thick-Crust, Airy Cheesecake

September 01, 2015/ Blair Cowan

So here's the thing about all these cheesecakes: I can't get graham crackers in this country, so every single one that I've made so far has been... well, ersatz. I can't decide whether I like digestive biscuits or rich tea biscuits better as a substitute for graham crackers in these recipes, and either way, since most recipes list graham cracker crumb quantities in terms of the number of crackers from which the crumbs came ('24 graham crackers, crumbled'), it makes it difficult to even determine the quantities I should be using. This time around, I used digestive biscuits and used 15 of them instead of the recommended 30 graham crackers, and the crust was the best one I've ever made, and far thicker than any I've previously created. This could be because I was using digestives, which are super thick, or because the pan I used (from Ikea, measuring 6.75x10.5 inches) was too small for what the recipe actually wanted (all it says is 'low rectangular baking dish'), but either way, it was awesome and I recommend it. Chances are you don't have a pan with those weird measurements, but it's roughly the same as using an 8x8inch square pan, so just go with that, and use way more cookies than what seems logical, and you'll have the same delicious cookie crust as me.

but I did discover something new about making an (admittedly ersatz) graham crust this time around: cookie crusts work so much better if you make them in a food processor. Previously, I had been grinding the biscuits in the food processor, then pouring melted butter over them and dumping them in the pie pan, hoping for the best. The problem with that method (although it was the method prescribed in most of the cheesecake recipes and also these bar cookie recipes) is that the crumbs stay very dry-- and though they come together later in the oven, spreading them evenly across the bottom and up the sides of a pan is incredibly difficult.

This recipe, though, has slightly more nebulous wording, which led me to, rightly or wrongly, add the melted butter into the food processor with the crumbs. (Alright, alright: it might also have been laziness. I had already had a negroni and it was at least 10pm on a school night when I decided to start this project, so I was trying to speed things along.) Anyway, watching it come together in the food processor was awesome, and I knew immediately I had stumbled across something great. Once it's done being mixed together, it forms sort of a paste that's completely evenly mixed, and thus super easy to press into a pie dish and up the sides of the pan. Best of all, it still comes out flaky, buttery, crumbly, and delicious after it's baked. Definitely try it next time you need a graham crust.

As always, this is a cheesecake best eaten with your friends. So make it for a party, or when there's a crisis afoot, or really anytime you're going to be hanging out with your besties. A little less impressive than a traditional springform cheesecake, it's still delicious and the stiffly-beaten egg whites give it a light, almost meringue-y texture that makes it better than the cream-cheese laden bricks that cheesecakes frequently turn into.

Note: the back of this recipe has a note scrawled in perfect penciled penmanship that reads 'wash roof Tri Sodium.' I think it's a code. Judson disagrees.

The verdict:

4 spoons out of five. Not easy enough to beat out the cheesecake that still holds my number one spot, but still tasty and with the best crust I've made in awhile.

The recipe:

Thick-Crust, Airy Cheesecake

the directions:

Preheat oven to 180C/350F.
Grind the crackers to a fine powder in the food processor or blender.
Add melted butter and continue to blend until a thick, dry paste forms.
Pour crust into dish and press against bottom and sides until of uniform thickness.
Separate eggs and whip the whites until very stiff.
Set whites aside.
Mix cottage cheese in mixer until curds are broken up.
Add salt, lemon juice, sugar, and milk.
Beat until mixture is the consistency of thick cream.
Beat reserved egg yolks slightly with a fork, then add to cheese mixture with vanilla and mix to combine.
Pour beaten whites into cheese mixture and fold together gently with a spatula or the mixer on low.
(Mixture should be close to uniform consistency, with no large lumps of egg white).
Pour into crust, sprinkle additional crumbs on top, and bake one hour or until set and golden brown.
After cake is done baking, cool slowly in open oven or on countertop to avoid falling.
Once cool, place in refrigerator to thoroughly chill.

the ingredients:

15 digestive biscuits or 12-ish graham crackers (the whole rectangular ones) plus 1 additional biscuit, ground fine, for sprinkling on top
4 oz butter, melted
3 eggs, separated
2 c cottage cheese
pinch of salt
1 tsp lemon juice
¾ c sugar
½ c milk
1 tsp vanilla

August 11, 2015

Oops I Totally Forgot Cheesecake, or, Simple, Classic Cheesecake

August 11, 2015/ Blair Cowan

Oops. I am just the worst, you guys. I forgot to post July's cheesecake of the month recipe. This is particularly alarming for me because I have SO MANY cheesecake recipes to get through that if I just run around skipping them all willy-nilly like this I am never going to get through all of them.

So here's the 6th cheesecake recipe I've tested for this blog. That means I've been doing this for almost 6 months, which is a pretty exciting feat in itself (but more on that later). This one made me nervous before I even started cooking it. For one thing, it's way more complicated than the last cheesecake recipe I made (my favourite one to date). And for another thing, Eleanor had written in the upper corner of the recipe card 'Emma's-- heavy cheese, real good.'* What does that even mean?

This recipe is dated from the 1940s, so this is one of her earliest recipes and definitely the earliest dated cheesecake recipe in the box... which is evident when you read the ingredients and the first one is 'pot cheese.' Judson and I have had a blast making hypothetical guesses about what pot cheese could actually refer to-- my favourite guess is that it's actually an abbreviation for 'potato cheese,' though the idea that it's marijuana-infused cheese did, of course, come up in conversation.

Another option for best accidental selfie I've ever taken.

Luckily, my dad came to visit recently and was able to provide us with a good answer. In case you, too, are in the dark about this, pot cheese is a 'dry-curd' cottage cheese, usually distinguished from other cheeses because it has no added salt. Having never seen this at a Scottish grocer or cheesemonger, I asked my dad for comparable products and upon his advice, I decided to use ricotta, fearing that drained cottage cheese would prove too grainy and not smooth enough. Since this recipe includes a bit of flour to help soak up any excess moisture, ricotta seemed to be the best option, though next time I might try mascarpone mixed with drained cottage cheese, just to see how it works.

Like a lot of her favourite recipes in the box, the more she liked a recipe, the fewer details she included on how to make it. I guess this makes sense-- if you make a recipe all the time, you only need the basics and you'll surely remember the rest, but it definitely makes my job interesting to try to figure out her intent. There are no instructions for how to make this-- the only instructions say to strain the cheese 'and cream,' then there is a note to use the crust recipe from the Sunshine graham cracker box, which is helpfully also included in the box (or, at least, the Nabisco pie crust recipe is included, so I used that, with the obvious substitution of digestive biscuits for graham crackers). And also I got nervous about using 1 ½ pounds of cheese, so I cut the recipe in half. So pretty much I broke all of my own rules about making no substitutions and following the directions to the letter, but I think you'll agree it was both necessary and worth it.

*Upon further investigation, it is completely possible that the card actually reads 'Enormous-- Heavy cheese, real good.' If so, I guess it's a good thing I cut the recipe in half.