Chilled Mango Cheesecake

I have been very lazy since Tuesday and just want to do nothing more than be a couch potato. Not sure if it's because my body is still adjusting to waking up so early since I had a break of a week in which I could wake up at any time I wished. My girl has gone on a sleepover at my friend's tonight, so I used that to push me to prepare some yummy goodies for them.

I wasn't very lucky with the two recipes I tried out today. Well, don't get me wrong. They both turned out great. But in both recipes, there were wrong measurements.

The first recipe I tried was this cheesecake one. I am not a fan of chilled cheesecakes. I love the rich, solid types. I don't like mousse-y ones either. To me, they are not real cheesecakes. However, I liked this one.

I had two mangoes in the fridge which my dad brought for my daughter, but I felt I could do something better with them and I still had about 750g of cream cheese in the chiller. I decided to pair them up and thus began my search for a recipe. I found this one on where else but 'bestrecipes.com'.

I can't seem to copy the recipe so I will need to type it, sigh.

Ingredients -

500g mango, diced (I only had 450g I think = 2 mangoes)
500g cream cheese
1/2 cup sugar or to taste
1/4 cup hot water
1tbsp gelatine
300ml cream (I used the Emborg whipping cream which I had in my fridge)
75g butter, melted
1/2cup plain sweet biscuits or Mcvities digestives (I seriously do not think 1/2cup is the right amount. I put in at least 1-1/2cups as there was too much butter in equation to the original 1/2cup)

Method -

1. Blend biscuits in food processor and mix with melted butter. Press into the bottom of a cheesecake tin.

2. Place tin in freezer while preparing the rest of the mixture.

3. Combine half of the mango with cream cheese and sugar in food processor and blend till smooth.

4. Add gelatine to hot water and stir till melted. Allow to cool.

5. Add cream to mango mixture and process for 40seconds.

6. To this mixture, add the cooled gelatine and blend for a few more seconds.

7. Gently stir in the remainder diced mangoes into cheesecake mixture. Pour into prepared tin. Refrigerate at least 6hrs , decorate with sliced mango and thickened cream.

Overall it had a very nice taste, but I wish the mangoes were slightly sourish so that it would lend a more acidic taste to the overall flavour . I think 1/2tsp of lemon juice might just do the trick.

The original recipe is from here.

Oreo Cheesecake

I had a good cheesecake recipe years ago, but haven't had any luck since then to come across any that I liked, till now. Have been itching to bake a cheesecake, so I searched for a simple one that wouldn't take up too much of my time, and at the same time, didn't require too many packs of cream cheese. I found this website which has a lovely collection of recipes, and I'll have to make time to try out some of them. This particular cheesecake recipe was taken from there. I'm sorry it took me so long, S.

I know it looks kind of weird, like some steamed egg with century egg bits, but this is yummy stuff! I substituted the full fat cream cheese with Kraft cream cheese light, which made it not so sinful.

Brownie Cheesecake

This is the reason why I had to bake twice yesterday. The first was for the brownie which was to be cut up to be mixed into cheese mixture. I then spent another hour baking the full cake. When slightly cooled, I made a ganache to go over. The reason being that my springform tin was rather big and I had no tray to make a waterbath with. Therefore, there were cracks on the surface of the cake which was not so pretty but really, it didn't turn out that bad. This is a very rich and sinful cake, best to be cut into small slices to serve. It is a recipe which I doubt I will be churning out regularly. It's a lot of work, first to crush oreo biscuits into crumbs and then make a base, next to bake the brownie part, etc. It isn't a pretty sight but it tastes great. You have to be a fan of rich cheesecake to enjoy this.

Ingredients -

3 packet of Philly cream cheese
4 eggs
1 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence

For the base, I didn't follow any particular recipe. I used biscuits from two regular packs of Oreo biscuits and removed the cream within. I then crushed them and melted enough butter to hold them together and freeze till set.

Method -

1. Cream cheese till smooth, add eggs one at a time till well mixed. Add sugar and vanilla essence and blend well.

2. Bake in 180degC oven for 45-60mins.

Let cool and refrigerate to set before serving.

Note - Always line the springform tin with aluminium foil to prevent the butter from seeping out under, which is what happened to me and I had a smoky oven. Lesson learnt. :P