Cheesy Hills

I love cheese cakes! I tried them in every possible variation.My favourite cheese cake is a baked cheese cake.Back home, my mother used to make them quite often. I remember the smell of a cheese cake while still baking in the oven and our face stuck into the oven door waiting for the cheese cake to get done.My mother used to complain about the fact that her cheese cakes never made their way to the fridge for chilling because we used to eat it all to the last crumb while still warm." don't open the oven door!" my mother used to shout everytime I would tell her to run quickly because the cheese cake was reaching the outside of the cake pan, and she would shout again " levae it, do not open that door ,it will fall down." This is why cheese cakes always freaked me out, baked cheese cakes I mean.They always looked so difficult to bake.But as many recipes that came to life in my kitchen when I came to Italy, cheese cake also started to be a star on saturdays and sundays after dinner or lunch. And soon I started to bake cheese cakes like a pro! ( well maybe not that pro, but as good as my mother, which is a pro to me) Now cheese cakes can be very tricky when it comes to baking them, there are some rules you have to follow otherwise, your cheese cake is doomed to a flat, pie like, cracked presentation:

1)When using fresh cream cheese in baking a cheese cake, you have to drain the accsess water out of the cheese using a cheese cloth (a pillow case will work just fine!)

2)It's wisely advisable to use parchment paper when baking a cheese cake, don't just put it at the bottom of the pan, put it also arround the edges at the inside of the pan.Just make sure to go 3 or 4 cm above the edges hight, because cheese cakes tend to rise and go much beyond the edges and then they suddenly fall after baking is done. So parchment paper will help in keeping the cake from spilling outside of the pan.

3)Tempreture: In the first 10 minute of baking the cake, you have to bake it at high tempreture, 200 c°. Afterwards, lower the heat to medium high, 180c° and continue to bake it for another 1 hour and 15 min.

4)When baking is done, DO NOT TAKE THE CAKE OUT OF THE OVEN! let it cool inside the
oven(after turning it off) for 3/4 an hour.

You see? it is not that difficult, just follow those simple rules and it's a piece of cake :-)

I wanted to bake a fancy cheese cake for some ladies that were coming over for a tea and a cake so I chose a cheese cake with Meringue puffs on top and some caramelized almonds, the recipe is taken from the book : "Home Baking" by Tova Aran

Cheese Cake With Meringue Puffs And Carmalized Almonds e

Ingredients

1 pie crust (you can find the recipe here)

6 egg whites

A pinch of salt

Half a cup sugar


6 egg yolks

half a cup sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 teaspoon of lemon zest

1 cup sour cream(170 ml)

3 spoonfull tablespoon of corn starch

750 gr cream cheese , drained.

1 table spoon of lemon juice


For coating:

5 egg whites

3/4 a cup sugar

A pinch of salt

1/4 teaspoon tartar cream

150 gr confectioner's sugar


For Garnish: Cramelized almonds.

Method:

1.Prepare the pie crust as instructed ,preheat oven to 190c°. 2.Greas a round baking pan of 26-28 cm and line bottom with parchment paper, put the crust dough in the baking pan and bake as instructed. 3.Beat egg whites with salt and sugar until shine and ferm. 4.Beat egg yolks separetly with half a cup sugar until light and foamy,add vanilla ,lemon zest cream and corn starch, continue to beat with an electric mixer on a low speed for a whole minute. 5.Alternately,add the cream cheese, the beaten egg whites and the lemon juice to the egg yolks mixture. 6.Pour batter into the baking pan and bake for 10 minutes at 190°c. Reduce heat to 170°c and bake for 1 hour. Meringue 1.Beat egg whites with 1/4 teaspoon salt, sugar and tartar cream until you get ferm peaks . 2.Gentley fold the confectioner's sugar into the meringue batter. Put batter into a pipping bag with a round tip of 1cm diameter. After cake is baked, pipe the meringue puffs on top and sprinkle cramelized almonds. 3.Heat the oven to 240°c , and bake carefully without moving away from the oven ,until meringues are nicely golden. Happy Baking!