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Cheesecake has been an annual guest at my place, typically arrives for my husband’s birthday as it his favourite cake. So every year, I forget the recipe I had used the past year and end up with a hit or a miss – either the cake has cracked or the biscuit:cake proportion is not ok or the cheese is too strong or it doesn’t set and so on.

The purpose of this blog was to help we with issue I always seem to face. I forget what I did and can almost never recreate the recipe out of memory. My 1st attempt at cheesecake a couple of months back gave me a great result, but I messed up with the strawberry glaze and made it too watery. Not wanting to repeat my mistakes, I kept baking the cheesecake until I got it right – family was extremely pleased at my repeated attempts (Read hubby) 😆

The family prefers the baked version rather than the set in the fridge version. Also they prefer the cheese to not have a strong flavour, it should be mild enough. I typically use only cream cheese in my cake to make sure it’s not a strong flavour. should you prefer a stronger flavour, halve the cream cheese portion and add 1 portion of either ricotta or cottage cheese. Also, there are no eggs in my recipe which makes it perfect to bake for friends who like “Eggless” cakes. The eggless version bakes quicker too compared to the 50-60 minutes baking time with eggs.

A steam bath is essential to prevent the cheese cake from cracking, I speak from experience here. If in the event it does crack, do not panic, drizzle the glaze over the top and you can get away with any imperfections 😜. This recipe can be used for both a 8″-9″ inch springform cake tin and 15-18 mini cheesecakes. I lost couple of my silicone liners and could only bake 9 of these cakes at a time. The leftover batter was cooked in my 7″ springform pan, so I’m approximating that this quantity will yieldat leastt 15-18 mini cheesecakes. Read my notes section for a 8″-9″ inch springform recipe.

Strawberry Cheesecake

A silky smooth cheesecake topped with strawberry glaze

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Prep Time 15 minutes mins

Cook Time 30 minutes mins

Resting Time 4 hours hrs

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Ingredients

  

Strawberry glaze

• 1 cup fresh strawberries + few extra for garnish
• 1/4 cup sugar adjust based on sweetness of strawberries
• 4 tbsp water

Crumb base

• 1 pack digestive biscuits
• 1/2 cup melted butter

Cheese layer

• 360 gms cream cheese (2 tubs)
• 200 gms sour cream (1 tub)
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 250 ml thick cream
• 3/4 cup sugar adjust based on sweetness preference

Instructions

 

Crumb base

• Preheat oven to 180c
• Blitz digestive biscuits in a food processor or inside a ziplock bag until they are coarsely powdered. Mix with 1/2 cup of melted butter
• spoon equal amount of crushed biscuits into greased cupcake liners placed in a muffin tray
• bake in the oven for 10 minutes or until set

Cheese layer

• Lower oven temperature to 160c
• Mix creamcheese, sour cream, thick cream, vanilla extract and sugar until smooth
• Spoon the cheese mix on top of the baked biscuit layer and smooth the tops with a spoon
• Place a baking pan filled with water in the bottom rack and place the muffin tray in the middle rack
• Bake for 15-20 minutes or until the cheese is set. The cakes should be slightly wobbly and you should see it leaving the sides of the cupcake liner slightly.
• Leave it to cool and place it in the fridge for atleast 3-4 hours

Strawberry glaze

• In a saucepan, add a cup of chopped strawberries, 4 tbsp water and 1/2 cup of sugar
• You may add few drops of lemon juice to make it more tart, I choose to skip it.
• Simmer on a medium flame stirring occasionally until you see the syrup thicken
• Set aside and leave to cool

Serving

• To serve, drizzle the strawberry glaze on the cakes and garnish with mint leaves.

Video

Notes

to bake in a springform pan, follow the same steps except 

1. Add the biscuit mix into the base and smooth it out to an even layer using the back of a glass.

   

2. cover the  sides and bottom of springform pan with foil to prevent water from leaking into it

   

3. Place it carefully into a wider pan and fill the base pan with water. The water level should come up to 1/4 of the springform pan
4. 
5. The cheesecake is set when the centre still has a slight wobble and it leaves the sides of the pan slightly.

   

Keyword cake, cheesecake, strawberry