April 13, 2011

Rare Cheesecake with Okara/おから入りレアチーズケーキ

I made rare (unbaked) cheesecake today.

Ingredients:
200 g cream cheese
80 g sugar
2 eggs
5 g gelatin
and very "soy-milky" okara, shown below.

今日は、レアチーズケーキを作りました。

材料:
クリームチーズ 200 g
砂糖 80 g
卵 2個
ゼラチン 5 g
そして、この豆乳たっぷりのおから

About 150 ml, which is probably half soy milk and half okara.
約150 mlで、多分半分は豆乳で半分はおからです。

You will need an electric whisk.
電動の泡だて器が必要です。

Directions:
1. Separate yolks and whites of eggs into two bowls.
2. In the bowl containing whites, add 40 g sugar, and make meringe.
3. In the bowl containing yolks, add 40 g sugar and okara, and whisk well.
4. Cut cream cheese into small pieces, microwave for 30-40 sec. to soften, add to the bowl mentioned in 3., and whisk well.
5. Dissolve gelatin in water, and add to the bowl.
6. Add meringe to the bowl, and mix lightly.
7. Transfer the contents of the bowl into a mold.
8. Put the mold in the fridge.

作り方:
1. 卵を黄身と白身に分けて、それぞれボールに入れます。
2. 白身の入ったボールに砂糖を40 g入れ、メレンゲを作ります。
3. 黄身の入ったボールに砂糖を40 gとおからを入れ、泡だて器でよく混ぜます。
4. クリームチーズを小さく切り、電子レンジで30~40秒温め、柔らかくし、3.のボールに入れ、泡だて器でよく混ぜます。
5. ゼラチンを水に溶かし、ボールに入れます。
6. ボールにメレンゲを入れ、軽く混ぜます。
7. ボールの中身を型にあけます。
8. 型を冷蔵庫に入れます。

About 2-3 hours later.
2~3時間後。

Then I realized that the cheesecake didn't set! Anyway, I had some.
チーズケーキが固まっていないことに気付きました。とにかく、少し食べてみました。

Obviously, I failed to evenly distribute the gelatin. I had undissolved bits of gelatin in my mouth! Next time, I will be more careful!
ゼラチンを均一に混ぜることができませんでした。口の中に溶けていないゼラチンの粒々が!次回はもっと注意します!

10 comments:

Sissi said...

Congratulations for this fascinating blog I am very happy to discover! Your posts are very interesting and make me eager to cook more Japanese dishes.
I have just read the older posts about Japanese table manners and really appreciated it. It makes one understand more about the the Japanese cuisine.
A very interesting cheese cake recipe... I often make cheese cakes without baking (with gelatin), especially in the Summer, but never add eggs. I find putting the gelatin in really warm water helps to better dissolve it.

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: Thank you for your comment.

This particular recipe is an orginal one of mine, inspired by both the hanjuku cheese recipe I posted about previously and a recipe for rare cheesecake that suggests adding meringe to give it a mousse-like texture.

I like rare cheesecake, but I often find it too dense and heavy, and I wanted to create an ideal rare cheesecake for me.

Anonymous said...

Dear Hiroyuki-san,
in Germany there is one classic cheesecake recipe which reminds me of yours named Kaese-Sahne Torte (Cheese-cream-cake). We use a very lean (while low fat) and soft white cheese called quark (engl. curd cheese?). Mix Quark with sugar, egg yolks, dissolved gelatine (best dissolved in a little heated milk, tricky to manage because you have to mix the dissolved gelatine with a little quark mixture and than with the rest to avoid gelatine clots) vanilla pod seeds. Keep mixture cool for a few minutes until it starts to stiffen, than gently fold in meringue (beaten egg whites) and whipped cream. Usually this mixture is filled in a mold with a thin layer of sponge cake on the bottom and top and should stay cool for a few hours to get stiff. It is heavenly fluffy and light (not low calorie...) but dangerous because of the salmonella loaded eggs in europe. You should not eat raw eggs down here or only very very fresh eggs.

Hiroyuki said...

Anonymous: Thanks for a detailed description. When Sissi first mentioned quark, I wondered what it was.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quark_(cheese)
Aha, so, it's like cottage cheese... Learning new things every day!

The Japanese like to have eggs raw, as you can see from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tamago_kake_gohan
In Japan, because of strict regulations regarding egg production, eggs are usually considered safe.

Sissi said...

Hiroyuki, actually quark, cottage cheese and curd cheese are not the same... They can be substituted sometimes, but not always.
Cottage cheese is usually a bit "runny", with bigger grains and is also good eaten alone with a spoon.
The German quark (if it's like the Swiss quark) is a cottage cheese thoroughly mixed. It is perfect for cold cheesecakes and I even make cooked cheesecakes with it.
The third, curd cheese (sometimes called "quark, so it's really confusing) is the driest of all. It is usually sold in a form similar to firm tofu or in a wedge shape. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quark_(cheese)
It is grainy, but firm. Its softness and dryness depends on the countries. The curd cheese if used very often in Polish, Russian and Hungarian cuisine (and maybe some others too...).
This last one is the best, mixed, to bake cheesecakes and delicious with a bit of cream/ yogurt+chives...
Quark and curd cheese are a bit confusing in English...

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: Thanks for a detailed explanation. That's very interesting to know. The sad thing is, I can never taste any of them in Japan!

Sissi said...

Hiroyuki, I have no idea how to make cottage cheese, but actually if you have access to raw cow's milk, you can make easily your own delicious curd cheese at home! (I do this sometimes). Given your culinary skills, you'll have no problems! Let me know if you are interested, I'll explain how to prepare it. (If you mix it it becomes what is called in Switzerland "quark", very good in cold cheesecakes...).

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: Thanks! I will ask you for a recipe when and if I can get raw cow's milk (which is probably the most difficult part...).

The other day, I made my first attempt to make "cottage cheese" from soy milk, using 400 ml soy milk and 40 ml vinegar. It didn't find it tasty, but my wife had no problems eating it. (Why women like sour food, I don't know.)

Sissi said...

In Europe it gets more and more difficult to get raw milk too, but not far from where I live, just a couple of kilometres from the French border they installed a raw milk distributing machine. I took it several times and it was perfect. Otherwise I tried making cheese with microfiltrated milk too (the closest to the raw milk), but it was not as good.
I am also one of those women who like sour and acid food, but rather in sweets and desserts. My favourite cherries are.. sour cherries, lemon tart is one of my favourite tarts. I even prefer sour alcohol cocktails and hate the sweet ones. Your tofu cottage cheese must have been good!

Hiroyuki said...

Sissi: I will post about my "cottage cheese" some day, together with some other dishes.

My wife like sweets, too! (She isn't fat, though.)