Light New York-Style Cheesecake

A friend of mine was telling me the other day about how his ex and the ex's new partner generously had him over for dinner, finishing the meal with a home-made cheesecake. "I hate to complain;" he said, "it was so lovely of them to cook me dinner... but that cheesecake! They made a low fat version with tofu, and they pretended it was regular cheesecake, and it was just awful!"

I like cheesecake. Alright, I LOVE cheesecake! And I've eaten some quite decent lowfat cheesecakes in my day, none of which involved tofu. My mother used to make one that I quite enjoyed; however, you could tell it was low-fat, because the large quantities of cottage cheese gave it a grainy quality. So when I made an impulse purchase of America's Test Kitchen Best-Ever Recipes at the check-out line at Berkeley Bowl Grocery and found a recipe in it for a delectable sounding light cheesecake, I was pretty excited. Although I get bored with their writing style, I appreciate the Test Kitchen/Cook's Illustrated's scientific approach to perfecting a recipe, and this one sounded like a winner. It wasn't long before I made the recipe. Results? A cheesecake for the ages. And if you decide to conceal its low-fat nature from your guests, I don't think any of them will go home and complain about how you tried to slip some tofu over on them!

One note: their recipe calls for straining low-fat yoghurt for 12 hours to make a concentrated "yoghurt cheese." I couldn't understand why they didn't just use Greek-style yoghurt, which is already strained, so that's what I did. (I especially like Fage brand, which is now made in up-state New York near my father-in-law's hometown.) The recipe below reflects this adaptation. If you choose to do it their way, strain 2 cups of lowfat yoghurt in a cheesecloth lined strainer over a bowl (make sure there is no pectin in the yoghurt!) for 12 hours, until you have 1 cup of yoghurt cheese.

p.s. I never did get around to making the strawberry topping - we liked the cake just fine straight up!


Light New York-Style Cheesecake with Strawberry Topping

Adapted from America's Test Kitchen Best-Ever Recipes

Crust
9 whole graham crackers (5 oz) broken into rough pieces, ground into fine even crumbs in food processor
4 TB (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, melted
1 TB sugar

Filling
1 lb 1% cottage cheese
1 lb light cream cheese, room temp (see note)
8 oz (1 cup) lowfat Greek yoghurt
1 1/2 cups (10.5 oz) sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1/2-1 tsp grated zest from 1 lemon
1 TB vanilla extract
3 large eggs, room temp
nonstick cooking spray

Topping
1 lb strawberries (about 1 qt) washed, dried, hulled, cut lengthwise into 1/4" wedges
1/4 c sugar
1 pinch salt
1/2 cup strawberry jam
1 TB lemon juice (from the lemon you've zested)

Notes: Okay, you know all these ingredients have to be organic, right? Especially the lemon! If you are using the zest (skin) of a fruit that's been sprayed with pesticides and/or wax in your cheesecake - yuck! On the light cream cheese: don't use fat-free cream cheese or tofu substitute - feh. That stuff has I-don't-know-what coagulant in it, and the consistency is foul. Light cream cheese is the stuff that usually comes whipped in a container; it's lower fat than Neufchâtel.


1. Take the eggs, cream cheese, yoghurt, and cottage cheese out of the refrigerator so they can come to room temperature.

2. Pre-heat your oven to 325 F, and put your rack in the middle position.


For the Crust:

3. In a medium bowl, combine the sugar and graham cracker crumbs, and stir in the melted butter until all is well combined. Press evenly into the bottom of a 9" springform pan, including over the joint where the top clasps the bottom.

4. Put the pan onto a baking sheet, and bake until the crust is fragrant and beginning to brown, 10-15 minutes. Cool on a wire rack. Raise the temperature to 500 degrees F.

For the Filling:

5. Meanwhile, line a strainer with a clean dish towel or several paper towels, and place it over a bowl or pan. Add the cottage cheese, and strain for 30 minutes.

6. Process the strained cottage cheese into your food processor until smooth, scraping down sides of processor as needed, about 1 minute.

7. Add the cream cheese and Greek yoghurt and process until smooth, 1 to 2 minutes, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.

8. Add the sugar, salt, lemon zest and vanilla, and process until smooth, about 1 minute, scraping the sides of the bowl as needed.

9. With the motor running, add 1 egg at a time and process until smooth.

10. Being careful not to disturb the baked crust, spray the exposed portions of the pan with cooking spray. Set the pan on the baking sheet and pour in the filling.

11. Bake for 10 minutes at 500 F. Without opening the door, reduce the temperature to 200 F, and continue to bake until the center of the cheesecake registers 150 F on an instant-read thermometer, about 1 1/2 hours. The center will be solid.

12. Transfer the cake onto a wire cooling rack, and run a paring knife around the edges of the cake to loosen. Cool at room temperature until barely warm, around 2 1/2 to 3 hours, running the knife around the edges about once an hour. Then wrap the cake up and refrigerate it.

For the Topping:

13. Toss the berries with the sugar and salt in a medium bowl and let macerate for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the sugar is dissolved.

14. Process the jam in the small bowl of your food processor (or use your invaluable immersion blender - even better!) until smooth.

15. Transfer the jam to a small saucepan and bring to a simmer over medium-high heat. Simmer, stirring frequently, until no longer frothy, about 3 minutes. Stir in the lemon juice, then gently stir the warm jam into the strawberries. Cover and refrigerate until cold.

To serve: Wrap a hot kitchen towel around the pan and let it stand for 10 minutes, then remove the sides of the pan and blot the moisture from the top of the cake. Let stand at room temperature for 30 minutes before slicing. Serve with the strawberry topping.