Lemon Meringue Baked Cheesecake

Lemon Meringue Baked Cheesecake

by | Jan 18, 2017 | 11 comments

I have a serious soft spot for lemon meringue pie but not because of the coconutty crust or the velvety smooth filling (made with condensed milk please!) or even the puffs of crispy-marshmallowy meringue that adorn the top. Nope, it’s not because of any of those things. In fact it doesn’t even have anything to do with the pie. It’s because it’s my dad’s ultimate favourite dessert and that makes it special in our family.

This version, made with a baked lemon cheesecake filling, combines the best of both pie and cheesecake worlds and the layer of tangy lemon curd that oozes out the bottom when you cut it, adds an extra heavenly dimension. And if you’d like to go to a little extra effort, I think cute little mini versions of this (made in ring moulds or even clean tins!) would make a memorable dessert!

Lemon Meringue Cheesecake

Serves 10-12

 

400g biscuits, crushed

100g butter, melted

540g full fat cream cheese, softened

150g castor sugar

3 eggs

20ml double cream

1 tsp vanilla extract

juice and finely grated zest of 1 lemon

½ cup store-bought lemon curd (optional)

4 egg whites

120g castor sugar

 

Preheat the oven to 160C. Grease and line a 22cm springform cake tin with baking paper. Combine biscuits and butter and press into the bottom and up the sides of the tin to form a crust. Beat the cream cheese until soft and smooth then add the castor sugar, eggs, double cream, vanilla, juice and lemon zest. Spread a thin layer of lemon curd over the crust then pour in the cheesecake filling. Whip the egg whites until soft peak stage then add the castor sugar gradually until the meringue is glossy and the sugar is dissolved. Top the cheesecake with the meringue mixture, using a spoon to create soft peaks. Bake for 1 hour then leave the door slightly ajar (or place a wooden spoon in the oven door to keep it open), switch the oven off and allow the cheesecake to cool completely. Refrigerate until set then serve.

 

 

Blueberry and Lavender Cheesecake

Blueberry and Lavender Cheesecake

by | Oct 12, 2016 | 2 comments

I’m not one to hold on to so-called ‘secret’ recipes but this one, I keep close. Well, until now. In fact I’ve been prolonging the day I’d share this recipe with anyone because it is just that good. It also required a lot of hard work to get it which is why I’m so precious about it. And we all know anything worth having is worth waiting for!  I first made this recipe as a student chef in the restaurant I used to work for. The recipe was kept under lock and key and your grimy commis chef hands were only allowed to touch it after 6 months of working in the kitchen! So you can only imagine the skip in my step when I was finally permitted to make it – I promptly memorised the recipe, of course, just incase the honour was revoked!

In it’s original form, it’s a luscious, rich, silky, velvety baked cheesecake laced with white chocolate and a pinch of cardamom but without the spice, it can be whatever you want it to be. And for the Spring issue of Food & Home Entertaining Magazine, I wanted it to have bursts of blueberry and a gentle lingering of lavender. Holy moly is this a good combination! So now that I’ve shared the most secret recipe I have, you NEED to make this. Don’t make me revoke the honour 😉

Blueberry, White Chocolate and Lavender Cheesecake

Serves 10-12 A LITTLE EFFORT 90 minutes

 

400g digestive biscuits

100g salted butter, melted

pinch of fresh lavender flowers

800g full cream cream cheese, room temperature

300g crème fraîche, room temperature

180g Natura Sugars Golden Caster Sugar

40g cake flour

4 large eggs

200g The Kate Tin White Chocolate, melted

1 tsp vanilla extract

zest of 2 lemons

pinch of lavender flowers, finely chopped, plus extra to decorate

250g frozen blueberries, plus extra for decorating

 

Preheat the oven to 120°C (or 100°C fan-forced) . Line the bottom of a 30cm springform cake tin with baking paper then grease the sides. Wrap the outside of the tin in foil to make it waterproof. Combine the biscuits, butter and lavender in a food processor and process until fine crumbs then press into the bottom of the lined tin. Place the cream cheese, crème friach, sugar, flour, eggs, white chocolate, vanilla, lemon zest, lavender and half the bluberries in a food processor and process until smooth then pour over the crust in the cake tin and sprinkle with the remaining blueberries. Place the cake tin on a folded tea towel (to stop it slipping) in a large roasting dish and fill with enough hot water until the water reaches halfway up the sides of the cake tin. Bake for about 1 hour or until the cheesecake is just set with a slight wobble in the middle (like set jelly). Allow to cool completely at room temperature in the bain marie then remove from the waterbath and refrigerate until set. To serve, unmould the cheesecake by running a knife dipped in hot water around the edges. Top with extra blueberries and lavender flowers.

 

 

TIP Lavender can be very powerful so use it sparingly for a gentle fragrance.

 

Self-Saucing Gooey Chocolate Marshmallow Puddings

Self-Saucing Gooey Chocolate Marshmallow Puddings

by | Jun 2, 2016 | 0 comments

CHOCOLATE PUDDING | #SPONSORED CONTENT

Chocolate pudding meets s’mores in this baked dessert that magically splits into a lightly spongy pudding with a chocolate sauce at the bottom. Self-saucing puddings are like the Harry Potter of the pudding world – it’s always so magical making them and as a kid I was always absolutely transfixed when my mom would pour hot water over the top of the pudding batter before putting it into the oven. I thought she was absolutely nuts, but then she’d tell me to wait for the magic to unfold so I’d sit in front of the oven on the kitchen floor and watch how the sauce and pudding swopped places in the oven! Now, I’m typing this and realizing that my mother probably just wanted 15 minutes to herself and me sitting in front of the oven watching a pudding rise was 15 minutes of pure heavenly silence! Hmmm.. I’m going to remember that trick one day!

Our family cookbook is filled with self-saucing puddings – there’s a ginger pud dubbed ‘Family pudding’ that’s spicy and golden and just incredible with custard! Then there’s a tropical pudding made using ideal milk as the sauce and tin of that insanely kitsch tropical fruit mix – it’s allure for me comes from the fact that we were never allowed to eat it because it was always on it’s way to my parent’s bible study group. And then there’s this chocolate pudding. The recipe is not a family one but was rather given to me by a dear friend as a gift when I turned 16. It was one of the many recipes in the now infamous ‘Katelyn’s Favouriteistest Favourite Flopproof Recipe Cookbook – Made with love by all her friends’ (SIC). It’s one of those puddings that you can crave at 8pm after dinner and be eating it by 8.30pm – because, I know you all have those moments too! You can make this as indulgent or simple as you like – add more chocolate, a shot of espresso, some caramel but whatever you do, don’t skimp on the Natura Dark Muscovado Sugar – it’s what makes this chocolate pudding so sticky and moist and gives it a deep dark flavour which takes it to a whole other level! Also, the Muscovado sugar is unrefined, Non GMO and non-irradiated which are a lot of fancy words which basically mean it’s much better for you and when it comes to chocolate pudding, I don’t need much to be persuaded into going back for seconds!

P.S. If your chocolate craving is a 911 situation and 8.30pm is too far away, this chocolate pudding can also be cooked in the microwave for 2 minutes on full-power although you won’t get that crusty top when you plunge your spoon through the gooey toasted marshmallow…

Self-Saucing Gooey Marshmallow Chocolate Puddings

Serves 4

 

100g cake flour

3 tbsp cocoa powder

2 tsp baking powder

¼ cup (40g) Natura Dark Muscovado Sugar

3/4 cup milk

40g butter, melted

1 egg, beaten

1 tsp vanilla

100g The Kate Tin Dark Baking Chocolate

1 packet white marshmallows

 

Sauce:

½ cup (90g) Natura Dark Muscovado Sugar

1 tbsp The Kate Tin Cocoa Powder

1 cup boiling water

 

To make the chocolate pudding, preheat oven to 180°C (fan-forced) or 200°C (conventional). Sift the dry ingredients into a bowl. Add the milk, butter, egg and vanilla and mix well to combine. Fold through the chopped chocolate. Spoon into 4 x 1 cup-capacity oven-proof dishes and place on a baking tray. Place the extra sugar and remaining cocoa in a bowl and mix to combine. Sprinkle over the puddings and pour over the water. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until the tops of the chocolate puddings are firm, risen and springy but the centre should still be a bit squishy underneath then place the marshmallows on top and bake for another 3-5 minutes until golden.

TIP For Mocha pudding, simply replace the boiling water with freshly brewed coffee.

Disclaimer: This post has been created in collaboration with Natura Sugars, however, I only work with brands I think are awesome and that I actually use myself.
WATCH HOW TO MAKE THE RECIPE FOR THIS CHOCOLATE PUDDING HERE:
Sticky Toffee Pudding with Dates

Sticky Toffee Pudding with Dates

by | Jul 2, 2015 | 0 comments

There’s nothing fancy or frilly about a baked pudding. It’s plain and simple but there is something deeply satisfying and supremely indulgent about a sticky pudding complete with pools of sticky toffee sauce and of course,  a good glug of piping hot custard. Something else which always accompanies a baked pudding, is a big spoonful of nostalgia. And this one, if it’s even possible, comes with an extra dose – because the recipe is over 60 years old.
When my great aunt Gwen passed away recently, I was given a great gift; 3 large falling-apart boxes filled with her love of recipe hoarding and all sorts of vintage kitchen paraphernalia. There were pages upon pages of recipes – not in a book or file but just stacks of cuttings torn out of magazines, from the back of soup packets and old shopping lists, some even quickly jotted down on the back of a church hymn booklet. But it was amongst these droves of recipes, that I discovered a few real gems.
And this recipe is one of them.
Cape Times Newspaper – Wednesday, June 16, 1954
 Margaret Pollitt writes: ‘One of the biggest problems of winter menu-planning is how to ring the changes with the sweet course – those sturdy summer standbys, ice cream, jellies and fruit salads, are of no use now to the mother whose children crave a big helping of pudding after the main course has been polished off.’
I cropped out the advert for corsetry services in the bottom right, although, in hindsight, that advert placement was very good!

Amongst recipes for pancakes (Margaret advises budding cooks that ‘tossing pancakes only comes with experience!’- you’ve been warned.), hot orange pudding, steamed sago pudding and roly poly, a date pud caught my attention. And it would be perfection when baked in my vintage pudding bowl (side note: how beautiful is this?!)

As a child I never appreciated puddings; I wanted to be a pastry chef and the simplicity of a baked pudding was completely lost on me. I only yearned to make the complicated, intricate desserts I saw in my cheffy cookbooks and magazines. My young imagination extended so much further than a quick-mix sponge drowned in thick UltraMel custard. How times have changed. Now… it’s the very thing I crave when the weather turns wet and grim. Perhaps that’s what makes pudding so universally soothing and rich in nostalgia. The fragrance of a baking pudding takes me back to Sunday afternoon lunches where we had to endure the delicious smell all the way through lunch. Torture. Followed by sheer bliss.

1954 Sticky Toffee Date Pudding

Serves 6-8

 

250g dried, pitted dates

250ml (1 cup) hot water

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

250g cake flour

250g butter

1 tsp (5ml) baking powder

2 large eggs

100g (1/2 cup) brown sugar

100g toasted pecans or walnuts, chopped

Soaking syrup:

60g butter

1 cup sugar

11/2 cups milk

2-3 tbsp sweet sherry (optional, or add 1 tsp vanilla)

Preheat the oven to 180C, fan-forced 160C. Grease 12 small dariole moulds or ramekins or a large 26 x 16 baking dish. Place the dates in a medium bowl and pour over the hot water. Sprinkle over the bicarbonate of soda and allow to stand for 30-45 minutes or until very soft. Place the softened dates (and the water) in a food processor with the rest of the pudding ingredients (except the nuts) and blend until smooth and combined. Stir in the nuts then pour into greased individual moulds or one large dish. For small puddings, bake for 10-15 minutes and large pudding, 30-35 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean. In the meantime, make the syrup; place all the ingredients in a saucepan and bring to the boil. Keep hot. Pour the hot syrup over the puddings as soon as they come out the oven. Serve immediately with salted caramel sauce (recipe below), vanilla custard or thick cream.

Salted Caramel Sauce

Makes 500ml

 

1 (395g) tin condensed milk

250ml (1 cup) cream

3 tbsp (45ml) brown sugar (like Demerara or Muscovado)

Pinch of good-quality salt (I used local Oryx desert salt)

Place the condensed milk, cream and sugar in a small saucepan and stir over low heat until the sugar is dissolved. Bring to the boil and simmer, stirring constantly until golden brown. Allow to cool, then sprinkle in the sea salt.