Triple Chocolate Cheesecake

So I am fairly certain that anything with three types of chocolate in it will always taste delicious, regardless of what it is. Add to that the fact that the chocolate will make up a beautiful rich cheesecake and you’ve got yourself a winner! Last weekend I decided to cook a three course lunch for my mum for mothers day and knowing that she loves all things chocolate and cheesecake I knew what the dessert had to be. But the question remained….how to do it?? 

I often steer away from making no bake cheesecakes after a previous experience which didn’t end up to be very successful. During that attempt, the recipe asked me to use gelatine powder to set the cake (again a chocolate cheesecake). Now either I was a bit heavy handed with the gelatine or the recipe itself was a little (or a lot) off but what I ended up with was a very dense, very firm cake that was a huge let down in all areas! After that time I thought that I would just steer clear of the gelatine set type cakes and stick to the baked cheesecake. 

Thankfully though, my approach changed completely after watching an episode of MKR (yep another recipe from this show! I’m sorry but I really love it!) where two contestants (QLD’s Paul and Blair) created what looked like a beautiful triple chocolate cheesecake. Aside from the fact that the recipe seemed very simple, the two dad’s are self confessed “non-dessert” people, so I thought that my chances of success would be slightly higher (it was one of those, “if they can do it so can I moments”). So off I went on a path of determination!

And luckily, I was NOT disappointed! Wow! what a recipe! The base is a lovely crumbly mixture that combines the flavours of chocolate, walnuts, dates and honey to make something really really special. The cheesecake mixture itself is beautiful, light, and creamy, with pockets of sour raspberries to cut through the rich flavours. Honestly, this would have to be the lightest, most delicious cheesecake I have ever ever eaten! If thats not proof enough, my family have continued to eat it every day this week and their still not sick of it! I promise you will love this one. It’s easy, tasty and so more-ish! The only issue that I had was that I think I used a slightly smaller cake tin then the recipe required, which meant I had a little leftover of the milk chocolate layer. I put this into another tin though to make a mini cheesecake, which my sister and boyfriend happily devoured as “chef-specials”!

So here it is, the recipe for Triple Chocolate Cheesecake (original found here):

Ingredients

1. Melted butter, to grease
2. 300g plain chocolate biscuits
3. 180g (1½ cups) walnuts, finely chopped, toasted
4. 10 dates, pitted (Soak in boiling water to soften for about 15mins)
5. 100g coconut oil
6. 2 tbs honey

Filling:

1. 750g cream cheese, softened
2. 100g caster sugar
3. 300ml thickened cream
4. 200g white chocolate, chopped
5. 200g milk chocolate, chopped
6. 200g dark chocolate, chopped
7. 3 tsp powdered gelatine
8. 125g fresh raspberries, plus extra, to serve (I used frozen)

Method:

1. Grease a 23cm cake pan with removable base with melted butter. Process biscuits and nuts in a food processor until the mixture resembles crumbs. Add dates, coconut oil and honey and process to combine. Press mixture over base and sides of prepared pan and refrigerate until needed.
 

2. To make the filling, using an electric mixer, beat cream cheese and sugar (on medium speed) until smooth and combined. Add cream and beat until smooth. Set aside.

3. Fill a small saucepan one-third full with water and bring to a gentle simmer. Place the white, milk and dark chocolate in separate small heatproof bowls. Working with one bowl at a time, place over pan and stir until chocolate has melted (don’t let the bowl touch the water). Allow to cool.
4. Place 60ml boiling water in a small heatproof bowl and sprinkle over gelatine. Stir until dissolved. With the motor running, gradually add to cream cheese mixture and beat to combine. Add a third of the cream cheese mixture to each bowl of melted chocolate and stir to combine.

5. Pour dark chocolate layer over chilled cake base. Dot with raspberries, then freeze for 5 minutes. Top with milk chocolate layer and freeze for 5 minutes. Top with white chocolate layer and refrigerate for 4 hours or overnight to set.

6. Slice cheesecake and place on serving plates.

I served mine with a raspberry coulis (cooked frozen raspberries with a bit of sugar and lemon juice to make a syrup) which is a lovely accompaniment!

 

Happy Baking and Enjoy!

 

Baked Ricotta Cheesecake with a Nutella Surprise!

 

Baked Ricotta cheesecake is a beautiful thing and up until recently I have only ever enjoyed it at Sydney’s Pasticceria Papa (where I might add, they make the best ricotta cheesecake you will ever taste!). For Easter though, I really wanted to bake something special for my family for dessert and after a little bit of googling I came across The Wholesome Cook, a beautiful food blog with a recipe based on the very cake that I love to eat!! Jackpot!

Now, as it is Easter I had to incorporate some form of chocolate into this recipe (but by all means you can leave it out) and as my family loves Nutella (who doesn’t!) I felt it was only appropriate to make my cheesecake a ricotta and Nutella flavoured one. I also had a few difficulties with the recipe so I have made a few changes/adaptations to the original (which can be found here at The Wholesome Cook’s Blog). Overall, this cake is beautifully moist and creamy and the Nutella hit is subtle and well balanced. Its a very light mixture, which I love and is encased in a crumbly, buttery pastry! I’m getting hungry just remembering it. If thats not enough to convince you to give it a go then let me add that my aunty (who hates dessert and never ever eats anything sweet) ate a huge piece in complete silence, occasionally omitting Oooh’s and mmm’s every so often. At the end of it she told me that she loved it! So it’s pretty safe to say its a winner of a dish! I will certainly be making this again especially after I’ve now ironed out some of my original problems.

I think that the most difficult part of this recipe is getting the pastry into the tin without having messy join marks. Now mine was far from perfect, but I think if you were just making a plain ricotta cheesecake then the best way to achieve this would be to roll out one big piece of pastry (with overhang) that you would lay into your cake tin, fill with mixture and then fold over the top (to join the side walls on the opposite side of the cheesecake). Because we are piping Nutella into it however, the cake needs to be baked without a lid, otherwise it cracks when you press the piping bag into it. The original recipe also only calls for 45mins of baking time, which I initially did. When I went to transfer it onto a plate on Easter morning however, I noticed that the base had gone all soggy, a sign that the cake was not cooked through properly. When I removed the lid I was faced with a nasty surprise, the creamy filling was entirely raw still! Luckily there was still time to pop it back into the oven. Somehow though, I lost my marbles right at that moment and put the cake back into the oven without a tin to support it. Great choice there by me, the walls collapsed onto it! It was at this moment that I went into panic mode but luckily my dad was around to save the day. He managed to push the whole thing back into the tin!! It then baked through for about an hour and once cooled held its shape! What a relief!! But all the difficulties were totally worth it to see the looks of enjoyment on my families faces! I hope you enjoy this one as much as my family did!

What you need:

For the Pastry:

• 100g butter, softened
• ¼ cup caster sugar
• 1 egg
• ¼ cup fresh cream (35% fat)
• 2 cups plain flour
• 3 tsp baking powder

For the Filling:

• 2 eggs
• 1/4 cup caster sugar
• 250g cream cheese
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• ¼ cup fresh cream
• 500g full-fat ricotta
• Small tub of Nutella

What I did:

1. Preheat your oven to 180 degrees C.

2. The first step is to make your pastry. Put butter and sugar in a bowl and beat with an electric mixer until light and fluffy then add your egg and cream and mix on a low speed to combine. Add your flour and baking powder to the mixer and mix on a low speed until combined into a dough. Kneed this lightly until just combined and set aside in the fridge for about 10mins.

3. In this time, make your filling by putting eggs and half the sugar into a bowl and mix with an electric mixer on high until pale and fluffy. In a separate bowl beat the cream cheese and remaining sugar on a medium speed until combined.

4. Combine the two mixtures with the vanilla extract and ricotta and mix on a low speed.

Assembling the Cake:

1. Greece your round cake tin with either butter or spray (I lined mine with baking paper which I think was unnecessary).

2. On a well floured surface, roll out your pastry to your desired thickness (don’t roll it too thin or it wont hold up with the filling. It should be about 4mm). Cut out a base first and place into your tin, then the side walls which you need to press into the base. Make sure there are no gaps or your cake will leak! Also cut out a lid which we will place on top later and prick this with a fork.

3. Pour your filling into the tin carefully and smooth out the top.

4. Put both pieces (the cake and the separate lid) into the oven and bake for about 1hr 45mins. The lid may be ready before this time so I would check on it at around 50mins and if cooked, remove to cool.

5. Once the cheesecake is cooked, it should have a slight wobble in the centre but be firm around the edges and have formed a nice “seal” on top. Turn the oven off and leave it to cool inside for 20mins with the door slightly open.

6. Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely before chilling in the fridge.

7. Using the nozzle of your piping bag, poke holes into the filling, piping Nutella into these as you go. You ca

n have as much or as little as you like then, when your happy pop the lid on top and trim off any extra pastry.

8. Dust the whole cake liberally with icing sugar and cinnamon and then serve and enjoy!

Happy Baking!!