Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Raspberry Cheesecake Delice


 
I love raspberries! There’s nothing like devouring a whole punnet of fresh raspberries! Given they’re not in season now, I'm left working with the frozen variety.

For a while now, I’ve wanted to make a raspberry glaze but didn’t know what to glaze it with so I turned to my trustworthy cheesecake recipe.  This recipe is so yummy, I could eat the batter on its own and once baked, it has that beautiful smooth and velvety texture of a New York cheesecake.  However, I've always had trouble with cracks appearing in the cheesecake.  In fact, the first time I baked it, my husband had turned to me and said, “I don’t think it’s supposed to have cracks in it” to which my response was, “nonsense, all good cheesecakes are meant to have cracks!” Ummmm, they're not! 
So this time, I wanted to get it right. Unfortunately, it was never meant to be as I was having a completely OFF day in the kitchen!

Firstly, we didn't have any digestives in the cupboard to make the biscuit base but instead had some crumbly tasteless wheat biscuits, so the base was lacking that oomph (I completely missed the buttersnaps hiding in the back of the cupboard, doh!).  I then decided to halve the recipe because I was only making miniature ones but of course, I didn't halve the amount of eggs required so the batter was extra runny (it still tasted good).  Then, the biggest mistake of all, I didn't let the cream cheese soften, HUGE rookie mistake! Arghh! Lacking in time (and ingredients), I couldn't bring myself to start all over again, and besides, the main reason for making the cheesecake was to use the raspberry glaze and to see if I could bake a cheesecake without any cracks appearing.     

With regards to cracks, to take the guesswork out of it, a baked cheesecake is set when it reaches 66 degrees.  Unfortunately, I killed my digital thermometer a few weeks ago, completely forgetting that I couldn’t get the battery wet (it ended up being washed with all the dishes).  This was also another sign that my cheesecake was doomed to fail.  Seeing the centre still wobbly made me doubt it was ready, but I followed all the literature and turned the oven off despite the wobbly centre.   To avoid the cheesecake deflating, I left the oven door ajar so that it could continue to set and despite the little indent in the middle, I was quite happy with the result.  At least I got one thing semi right!

The raspberry glaze was surprisingly very easy to make!  After all the effort, I'm not really sure the addition of the glazed texture was necessary, however I do find it visually appealing so will keep it next time for that reason. And next time, it would be a lot easier to make a non-bake cheesecake, and that way I wouldn't have to worry about any indents in the middle of the cake! Aahhh, the beauty of hindsight!

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