GBBO 2015: Week 4 Desserts - New York Baked Cheesecake

In addition to my banana cheesecake I wanted to make a baked cheesecake as well to properly test my cheesecake skills. A popular recipe that I found was for a New York style baked cheesecake, and it also looked relatively simple as I didn't want to try something too adventurous and have it fail - I'm a perfectionist. I used this recipe for my bake.

The first part of the bake is to make the base.

Ingredients:

140g plain flour

50g butter

50g golden caster sugar

1 egg yolk

1tsp baking powder

To make the base, combine the flour, butter, sugar and baking powder in a mixing bowl. 

I tried mixing them with a spoon but found it was easier to do it with my hands due to the butter. Once these are combined, add in the egg yolk. 

Then tip the mixture into the cake tin and push it down so that it covers the entire base. I ended up with quite an uneven base as the mixture was difficult to work with. Which is evidenced by the sheer amount of fingerprints you can see in the photo.

This then went in the fan oven at 130 degrees celcius for about 25 minutes. 

While the cheesecake base is cooling, the mixture for the cake part can be made.

Ingredients:

900 cream cheese

190 golden caster sugar

4 eggs

1tbsp vanilla bean paste

This part is rather straightforward; simply put the cream cheese, sugar and vanilla into a bowl and mix. 

Then, mix in the eggs one at a time. 

With the mixture combined, it is ready to be poured over the base and baked. This recipe asked for the bottom of the cake tin to be wrapped in tin foil and then placed in a deep baking tray so that water can surround the tin - like a very large and very heavy bain marie. I think this is so the inside doesn't overheat or something like that. 

The recipe said to bake in the oven for 40 minutes, however it did not state a change of temperature from when I baked the base, so I left it the same. However this was not hot enough and it took so long to cook. I turned up the oven to about 160 degrees and that started to work. So I really don't know how long it was left in the oven as it took longer than was probably correct. The recipe said that when cooked the top should still have a wobble to it, which was quite hard to judge. 

The cheesecake was cooked by the time I took it out the oven luckily as the wait was actually horrible as I was staring at it in the oven for well over an hour. It didn't have a very strong taste to it, just a mild vanilla taste. I don't think that I would make this particular cheesecake again as I prefer things to have a bit more flavour and this just took so long to bake I don't want to see it again to be honest.

GBBO 2015: Week 4 Desserts - Banana Cheesecake

Cheesecake has always seemed like an easy thing to make, as it is the dessert of choice for people on shows like Come Dine with Me and Dinner Date. So I wanted to push myself more with this rather than keeping it simple. I decided to make a Banana Cheesecake this week, using this recipe.

The first part to making the cheesecake was to make the biscuit base.

Ingredients:

250g Digestive biscuits

150g Butter

30g light Muscovado sugar

First thing is to take the digestive biscuits and smash them into crumbs. When smashing up biscuits, cover them with a tea towel as I am still finding bits of biscuit all over the kitchen days later.

Melt the butter and sugar in a pan and then stir in the biscuit crumbs.

Put the biscuit mixture into the pan and use the back of a spoon to pat it into the base of the tin.

Then, leave the biscuit base to set in the fridge for half an hour.

The next task is to make the actual cake part of the cheesecake.

Ingredients:

300g cream cheese

120g golden caster sugar

220g banana

250ml double cream

4 gelatine leaves

70ml orange juice

3 egg yolks

The first thing to do is mashing up the bananas and placing them in a pan with the orange juice and letting it cook on a low heat.

Then when the banana starts to cook, turn the heat off and let the mixture cool.
In a small bowl I put the gelatine leaves in cold water to soak for five minutes - this is just what the packet that I bought instructed, other gelatine packets may differ. Then I stirred the gelatine into the banana mixture, one sheet at a time.
In a mixing bowl, combine the cream cheese, caster sugar and egg yolks.

In a second bowl, whip the cream. Then fold the cream into the first mixture.

Then pour this combined mixture into the pan with the banana mixture in.

Pour the finished mixture on top of the biscuit base.

I then left the cheesecake to set in the fridge overnight as I don't know exactly how long it takes to set. 

To finish it off, I cut up a banana into slices and put them on the top - my attempt at making it look pretty. 

This cheesecake was so delicious, I could definitely taste the banana in it and the biscuit base was so yummy. Everyone who tried it liked it so I will definitely be making this again.