Chateau Gateau

Team Shambles

Camembert cheesecake? What? We were taken back a little bit when we saw this recipe, because the cheesecakes that people are most familiar with use cream cheese and not, well, Camembert! Roopa (who is admittedly not a connoisseur of most things) had not even heard of Camembert cheese before! Regardless, it’s not an ingredient that typically comes to mind when you think of baking.

Alana’s favourite!

The final product resembled a baked wheel of cheese, but doesn’t taste like one! It’s not too sweet or too cheesy, and is quite dense. The sweet paste crust goes very nicely with the main body of the cake as well. Overall, it was pretty phenomenal.

CAMEMBERT CHEESECAKE (makes 1 x 6″ cake)

INGREDIENTS

• sweet pastry crust
• 180 mL homo milk
• 30 g sugar
• 36 g cake flour
• 60 g Camembert cheese
• 90 g cream cheese
• 300 mL cream
• ½ lemon, juiced
• Jam, we used apricot (optional)
• Sponge crumbs (optional)

DIRECTIONS

1. Make a sweet paste crust by cutting a circle with your pastry ring, as well as ~ 2 inch strips to cover the inside of the cake ring. (Instructions for sweet paste here).
2. Pre-bake the sweet paste base until the edges start to show colour. After baking, cover the bottom with jam and sponge crumbs, if desired. Press the sponge crumbs into the jam.
3. Preheat oven to 360 F.
4. Mix together 1/3 of the milk, sugar, and flour.
5. Heat remaining milk with cheese, and add some to the flour mixture.
6. Mix milk into flour mixture well, add back to the pot, and bring to a boil. Remove from heat.
7. Add the cream and lemon juice to the cheese mixture and mix well.
8. Put the cheese mixture in the cake ring, ensuring the cheese mixture does not cover the top of the top of the sweet paste.
9. Bake for ~30 minutes. Sweet pastry should be a golden brown colour, and the top will look like baked cheese.

Notes:

• You can use a variety of types of soft cheeses (blue cheese, goat cheese, etc.). Play around with the ratios depending on the type (and potency) of the cheese in question. The temperature you serve your cake at will also affect the flavour; the cooler the cake the less flavour you get.
• This cake can either be sweet or savoury, depending on how you flavour it.
• Press the sweet paste edges down into the base quite well.
• If you add the lemon juice to the milk before it boils, it will curdle.
• If you use Camembert, you will have bits of skin in the mixture.
• Don’t use a water bath for baking.
• If you make a large recipe, you need a water bath for mixing the cheese.
• Cheese ripens in the fridge, so the taste will strengthen over the course of a few days.
• After baking, you may want to trim the top edges with a paring knife while the cake ring is still in place.