I have been wanting to do some “healthy” cheesecake for my little boy who adores cheesecake as his desserts. Cheesecake usually gives people the impression as a sinful and fattening dessert with full fat cream cheese, heavy cream and heavy dose of sugar. So I started doing my research again, hoping to find cheesecake recipes that are healthier.
I first decided on Tofu cheesecake, which is adding something nutritious to the cheesecake. Tofu possesses amino acids, iron, calcium and other micro-nutrients. I came across websites like “Cooking with Dog”, I found out that in Japan, they call no-bake cheesecake as rare cheesecake. And the Japanese style rare cheesecake uses gelatin to “gel” up or harden the cheesecake, and they usually use plain yogurt to replace heavy cream in the cheesecake.
Next, Tofu is usually quite bland of taste by itself, it does not add much taste to the cheesecake. I have read variations like Green Tea Tofu Cheesecake. But if I am making this cheesecake for a small kid, green tea flavor does not appeal much to this age group. It has to be fruity flavor. Finally I decided to use Raspberry fruit. Raspberry is rich in antioxidants and possess other nutritional values. I thought it will be interesting to add a sourish fruit to spice up the “blandish” taste of tofu. So this inspired my below creation.
After 1.5 hours of freezing, my little boy kept insisting he wants to eat his “ice-cream cake”. I am very excited to know what is the outcome as well. After my boy first tasted the cheesecake, he loves it so much that he asked for second serving. After his second serving, he cried for third serving again which I had to stop him. I tasted the cheesecake, it turned out to be very refreshing, the fruity taste blended in very well with the Tofu. This is a surprise to me…. (Anyway, the cake is gone by the next day…. and my little boy is still asking me where is his ice-cream cake?)
My tolerance for sugar is low, I do not enjoy those super-sweet and sugary cheesecakes sold outside. So if you have a sweet-tooth, when you are making the raspberry sauce, taste the sweetness if it is right for you, you can add in more sugar if you like. Likewise for the cream cheese, I taste the mixture as I gradually add the sugar to it, to the level just right for me. If you want it sweeter, you can add more sugar to it. The trick is to add the sugar slowly, and taste as you go along, as cream cheese mixture is edible before freezing anyway. I don’t recommend anyone to blindly follow recipes and pour all the sugar in at one go, as it will not be reversible.
If you prefer just plain Tofu Cheesecake, just skip the step on making Raspberry Sauce, Ta-Ta, you will have an Original Tofu Cheesecake!
Enjoy….! Best served after cheesecake freezed in freezer for 2-4 hours …. if you can wait that long …..
Making the biscuits base.
Making the Raspberry Sauce.
Beating the cream cheese mixture.
Japanese Style Rare (No-bake) Raspberry Tofu Cheesecake Recipe (6″ cake tin)
Preparation Time: 50 mins, for 2- 3 pax
Recipe modified from Cooking with Dog
Ingredients
Ingredients A:
6 pieces of graham crackers
30 grams butter (soften)
Ingredients B:
25 pcs raspberries (about)
30 grams sugar
30 ml water
Ingredients C:
250 grams cream cheese (I use full fat) (soften)
300 grams (1 tub) silken tofu
200 grams low fat plain yogurt
50 grams sugar
100 grams whip topping
10 grams gelatin + 2 tbsp water
Method:
Prepare the Crust:
- Line the cake tin base with grease proof paper.
- Placed the graham biscuits into a zipper bag, use a big roller pin to crush it to fine crumbs. Add in soften butter, mixed well.
- Pour the biscuits crumbs into the cake tin and press the biscuits firmly against the base.
- Freeze the cake tin for at least 30 mins.
Prepare the Raspberry Sauce:
- In a saucepan under low heat, put in water, raspberries and sugar. Using a spoon to press and smashed the raspberries.
- Once the sugar melted, let it cool down.
- Use a strainer to strain off the seeds. Set aside.
Prepare the Cheesecake:
- For the Tofu, use a cheesecloth or Chinese soup bag to squeeze out the water. Set aside the smashed and drained tofu.
- Cream cheese needs to be taken out in advance and let to soften at room temperature for at least 1 hour.
- Sprinkle the gelatin on water, then put this gelatin into a hot water bath to melt the gelatin. Set aside.
- In a bowl, place the soften cream cheese, yogurt, tofu, sugar and whip topping, use an electric beater and beat to mix the ingredients together. Then add in the gelatin liquid. Beat quickly to mix and stop. (Alternatively, you can put all the Ingredients C into the blender and blend).
- Separate the cream cheese mixture into 2 bowls. One bowl will be the original Tofu favor. In the other bowl, add in the raspberry sauce (please set aside 1-2 tsp raspberry sauce to make swirl on the top of the cheesecake later) and mixed well.
- To assemble, take out the frozen cake tin base, first pour the original Tofu favor cream cheese mixture into the cake tin, spread evenly. Then pour the pinkish Raspberry-Tofu cream cheese mixture on top of the original Tofu favor, spread evenly. Then drop a few drops of raspberry sauce on top of the cheesecake, use a chopstick or skewer to make swirls or designs.
- Freeze in the freezer compartment for at least 4 hours. Serve.