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Saturday, August 18, 2007

Japanese Cheesecake - Delicious

Whatever you want to call this cheesecake, it is fantastic. I call it a Japanese Cheesecake because the texture is like those that are advertised as Japanese Cheesecakes from the bakeries. Having never been to Japan, I don't know if their cheesecakes are like this one, but if they are, I'm going to eat lots of them.

I read about this recipe from Ellie of Kitchen Wench, who had in turn read about the recipe from Anh of Food Lover's Journey. Both Ellie and Anh say they love the cake, and for good reason I found out. Anh wrote that it is perhaps the best cake she has ever baked. Well, I brought one of the cakes to work and one work mate said that it was the best cake he had ever eaten. That's a big call.

This cake is definitely very different in how it is prepared to how it tastes. It's so light that it goes down so easily that you find yourself finishing a whole piece before you know it. This was one of the fastest disappearing cakes ever. Having baked it on Thursday, it was all gone by late Friday.

I won't bother re-writing the recipe. Just go to either Ellie or Anh's blogs and you have full instruction there. All I can say is that you must make it, it tastes great. Just a final note, the recipe requires cake flour. I had no idea what this was either. But a commenter on Ellie's post wrote that you can buy it in Safeway or Coles nowadays. It is called "Cake, Biscuit & Pastry Flour”, made by Anchor. It's a blue box for the plain variety. This flour is described as some triple milled flour with this and that. I can't remember half of it, but it's suppose to give a light texture to cakes and biscuits made with it.

I don't like black sesame that much so just added a little. I couldn't really taste the sesame and don't really know if you even need it. It's up to you what flavours you like and what to add. I think it tastes great without any added flavours.


EDIT: I've decided to post the recipe in case other people's blogs go down but mainly so its all easier to find when I want to make this recipe again myself.

Japanese Cheesecake

Ingredients

250g cream cheese
50g unsalted butter
100ml cream (35% milk fat)

60g cake flour
20g cornflour
6 egg yolks
1 tbsp lemon juice
1/4 tsp salt

1tbp black sesame powder

6 egg whites
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
140g castor sugar

2-3 tbsp of fresh milk

Method

* Melt cream cheese and butter over a double boiler. Whisk to combine. Set aside to cool. Add the cream and whisk to combine.
* Meanwhile, line and grease the base and side of a 8-inch spring form cake pan. Preheat oven to 160C (fan-forced)
* Sift the cake flour and corn flour to the cheese mixture. Add in egg yolk, lemon juice, sesame powder and salt. Gently whisk to thoroughly combine all the ingredients. At this stage, if your mixture is a bit too stiff, add in 1-2 tbsp of milk. The mixture should be similar to your normal cake mixture.
* Whisk egg white with cream of tartar until foamy. Add sugar, tablespoon by tablespoon. Whisk until soft peak forms (don’t whip the egg white too stiff, the cake will be likely to crack).
* Add 1/3 of the egg white to the cheese mixture to lighten it. Then, gently but thoroughly fold the egg white to the cheese mixture. Be careful not to destroy all the air bubbles in the egg white.
* Gently pour into the prepared pan. Using foil, wrap the outside of the pan. Put the cake pan into a roasting pan. Add boiling water to half-way of the cake pan.
* Bake in the oven for 1 hour 10 min or until the cake is set.
* Take out, leave in the pan to cool. Serve at room temperature.

13 comments:

  1. Hey Thanh, glad you like the recipe. This is defenitely one of the best cakes I tasted! And I am glad you like it. :)

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  2. Anh, I loved the cake. Thanks for putting it on your blog originally so that we could all know about it. I'm about to make it again actually. I didn't get to eat enough of it. Only had one piece before it all disappeared.

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  3. Oh wow, that looks great! Thanks for the links, I know what I'll be attempting to make tomorrow on my day off.

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  4. Anna, you should make two of them while you're at it. They really do finish off fast.

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  5. hey thanh, i'd been following anh's and ellie's blog posts on this recipe and now after finally seeing you giving it a try you inspired me to try as well. Let me tell you, i had the same reaction to it at work as you did too! People absolutely loved it!

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  6. It's a great cake isn't it Serenity. I've just made it again. I also thought it was going to be quite hard to make as I've never made a cake where you bake it in the oven while putting it in water. But it turned out to be very easy.

    After I had written the post, another work mate talked to me and said that he too also thought it was one of the best cakes I've made. He hadn't heard that a separate work mate had also said the same thing. This simple tasting cake really has its fans, myself included.

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  7. Thanh,

    Please tell me when you are going to bake another one of these cakes. I spoke to your low gong last week and he promised something sometime in the next weekend.

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  8. Anonymous, I will make another one within this week hopefully. I will bring some over for your especially.

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  9. This looks nothing like what you made for me last night!!

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  10. Hi

    i tried making this and the cake went wrong :( def must be putting the foil over the top of my cake pan?

    I didn't use cake flour, but instead replace the 100ml cream with milk as Anh has mentioned.

    Also, did you mean putting water in cake pan or roasting pan?

    Sorry I suck at baking. I must have done a lot of wrong things for it to not turn out right. It was hard, dense and stiff-ish. The cake didn't rise.

    I'm sure the cake is nice as u mentioned so I will attempt again

    Twin

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  11. Hi Twin, I have made this cake at least 10 times so I know what can go wrong as I've done it a few times too. Let me answer your questions one by one.

    If you cake is dense, it means that water definitely got into the cake.

    If you make this cake using a spring form tin (which is what I did the first few times), you must wrap lots and lots of layers of foil around the bottom of the tin, so that no water can get in. If water gets in, which has happened to me, the cake becomes very heavy and dense. A better way is to use a normal cake tin where the base does not lift out. Just line the tin with baking paper so you can get the cake out later.

    I've tried making it without using cake flour and it is a bit more dense, but still tastes nice. But I prefer the cake flour version with the cream as that gives a much lighter texture. As I wrote, you can buy cake flour from Coles or Safeway. It's in the same location as the normal flour and comes in a cardboard box.

    After you place the cake tin with the cake mixture into a roasting pan, you pour water into the roasting pan until it comes half way up the side of the cake tin. So basically, the cake tin is sitting in a bath of water. When you bake your cake, the top might start to look like it's getting a tad burnt if you have the temperature too high. Don't be tempted to cover the top with foil to stop it burning as the water from roasting pan rises as steam and hits the foil and condenses, falling back into the cake and making it dense. I have wrapped the top with foil once too to stop it burning and the cake was very dense.

    Hope all that helps. If you make it right, this cake is so amazing in its simplicity. I've decorated in a few different ways but I always prefer the plain version.

    Drop me a comment if you give it another go and still have problems.

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  12. Hi, I was just wondering what temperature to bake the cake at using a regular oven (not fan-forced)?
    The cake looks so good..
    Thank you!!

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  13. Hi Anonymous, if using a non fan forced oven, use 180C. This cake is amazingly delicious, so light and fluffy.

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