Le Cheesecake

The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey’s Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge.

What is it about cheesecake that is so enthralling? Is it the creamy texture? The fascinating base? The endless ways to top it?

I don’t know. I just know it’s good.

And yet, even though it’s one of my most favourite desserts, I hardly ever make it.

Perhaps that’s because I can very easily eat an entire cheesecake myself. Oh, yes.

Been there. Done that. Have the t-shirt. (Speaking of t-shirts … have you bought your DK t-shirts yet???)

But I’m always happy to try a new recipe for cheesecake so I was pleased to see that Jenny of Jenny Bakes, our lovely hostess for the April 2009 Daring Bakers’ challenge, chose a cheesecake recipe as this month’s test.

While the recipe itself is straightforward, the challenge for Daring Bakers was to find new and interesting ways to interpret and flavour the cheesecake.

I’ll be honest. I didn’t have a lot of time to execute some of the more fanciful ideas that came to mind (let’s just say one involved silicone and cherry blossoms). Thankfully a lack of time and some timely prudence both conspired to prevent such plans.

In the end, I made your standard nine-inch cheesecake but I challenged myself by trying some flavours in a cheesecake that I’d never tried before.

For starters, I flavoured both the crust and the cheesecake with a healthy dose of rose water, which I have come to love.

Secondly, I added the flavour of Meyer lemons. While I know what Meyer lemons are, I’d never actually tasted one before April of this year. I found them in a local supermarket and bought two sacs because I was so excited. So I used some of the Meyer lemon juice and zest in the cheesecake as well.

I then made candied lemon slices with more of the Meyer lemons and used that as a topping to the cheesecake, spooning the candied lemon juice over the top to add shine and some sweetness.

While I did not taste the cheesecake myself (I brought it to a group of people that I work with who were particularly helpful to me during a big project earlier this year), from what I understand it was a creamy, luscious cheesecake that disappeared very quickly. And it was a pretty cheesecake too.

I can’t wait for Ontario strawberries to come in. I’m going to be making this again topped with a fresh strawberry sauce.

And I will call it, Le Cheesecake.

Ciao!

For the cheesecake recipe, please visit Jenny’s blog.