Week 15 Cheesecakes

Today's menu is Mango Cheesecake, Blueberry cheesecake and a Zug Kirsch Torte. 

We started with the Mango Cheesecake because it was a no bake cheesecake and it needed to be chilled in the fridge for hours to set. We made 2 small cakes so that we can each take one home and also it will take a shorter time to set. 

My cheesecake didn't look too nice because of a few reasons. Firstly, we were rushing to clean up when I took this photo so I didn't have time to smooth the sides of the cake after removing the acetate strip and the cake ring. Secondly, when I poured the mango jelly on top of the cake, it set really quickly because the gelatine in the jelly set almost immediately when in contact with the cold cheesecake. Lastly, I think it doesn't look nice because I didn't dish it up on a plate. It was still on the baking sheet. Ha Ha. 

No bake mango cheesecake.

Ah.... a slice of mango cheesecake, this photo was taken at home. Now the cheesecake looks a little soft and slightly deflated. I guess it melted a little during transportation. Next time I need to walk faster to get home. But the taste was still pretty good. The base of the cake was a sweet crust pastry. It was a little difficult to cut the cake and not shatter the sweet crust. 

Mango Cheesecake.

Next we made a baked blueberry cheesecake in sweet crust tart cases. We firstly made the sweet crust and blind baked them in the muffin tray. As the tart cases were cooling down, we prepared the cheese filling. The cheese filling had cream cheese and ricotta cheese. It was my first time using ricotta cheese. It made the batter look lumpy and I could still see little bits of the ricotta after folding everything in. I was worried that it will affect the texture of the cheesecake but it turned out pretty nice and smooth. 

Tart cases with frozen berries.

 We placed a couple of frozen blueberries in the tart cases and then poured the cheese mixture into the tart cases. Then we topped it with more blueberries. The berries were not mixed into the batter because we didn't want it to bleed and affect the colour of the cheesecake. 

Baked mini blueberry cheesecake tartlets.

 Oh! Looking at the photo now, I am reminded that we added almond flakes into the sweet crust pastry before baking. It gives it a nice nutty flavour. 

 Last one is Zug Kirsch Torte. It is a layer cake from Switzerland and it consists of layers of nut-meringue, sponge cake and butter cream which is flavoured with Kirsch, which is a type of cherry brandy. Zug is a city located an hour south of Zurich. This cake was invented by Pastry chef Heinrich Höhn in 1921 and has won gold medals in pastry exhibitions in Lucerne in 1923 and 1928. It is layered with pale pink butter cream and topped with glacé cherry and the sides of the cake is covered with roasted flaked almonds.

Japonaise.

 Japonaise is a meringue with the addition of ground nut meal. In this case, we used almond meal. The batter is usually piped onto  a baking sheet and cooked at low temperature to dry out the mix , resulting in a light and crisp, nutty disc which is used as a structural component in a gateau. For today, it is used in the Zug Kirsch Torte. 

Kirsch Torte.

Traditional diamond patterned icing sugar of the Zug Kirsch Torte.

The way we made it was with a thin base of sponge cake and layered with butter cream and the japonaise. I found many pictures of the Kirsch Torte on the internet where the sponge cake layer was in the middle and it was much thicker. The butter cream that was used was just a thin layer. I am not sure which is the right way but I would prefer the thick sponge and less butter cream much more than what we made which was way too heavy for me. 

Layers of the Kirsh Torte.

It is very interesting to be making all these traditional cakes, to know its history and also to see how some recipes have changed to meet the requirements and taste of people today. I wonder if one day I will be able to create something and name it too. Well I still have a lot to learn. 加油!!