Calling on cheesecake experts

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Hey everyone,

I apologies in advance for what will likely be a very long drawn out post.

I've come here looking for some advice from anyone who knows anything about baking cheesecakes. I'm not much of a baker myself, or even much of a cook either. But when I do bake/cook, I'm a bit of a perfectionist and tend to overthink it until I get it right. A couple of weeks ago, I had the best baked cheesecake I've ever had at a fish restaurant. I've been there multiple times over the years and the cheesecake is always amazing (along with every other course). Recently I decided to try and find a way to replicate it as I've never managed to find a similar cake from any local shop.

The culprit is pictured below, its a baked white chocolate cheesecake with raspberry ice-cream and coulis (I've also had it with a butterscotch ice-cream). The flavor is perfect but its also very moist and creamy. Not like a no-bake cheesecake, but almost like you're cutting through a soft butter. Definitely creamier than your average supermarket cheesecake where I'm from anyway.

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Someone recommended that I give this recipe a try, so I did. The only notable difference was that I used a total of 200g white chocolate instead of 225g for no other reason that they come in 100g packs and I was trying to save money and waste. I also used a 7" tin instead of an 8".

General it went fairly well, everything happened as I expected it. The only confusing part for me was the baking, as I found it hard to decide when it was done. I ended up baking for about 55 mins as, by 45 mins, it still rippled like a thick cream when I tapped the tin. I'd also noticed that the sides had risen but not the center, so I took that as a sign that it wasn't cooked. Having now looked at some videos on YouTube I now feel like that might not be an accurate indication.

Overall I think it went well, but I was a tad disappointed. It was drier, "almost" crumby, a bit more likely your average cheesecake I guess, and I couldn't really taste the white chocolate enough, the cheese overpowered the chocolate. Here are some pics..

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So if you've made it this far.. I'm after some tips on how I might achieve something closer in terms of taste and texture to my first photo.

The most obvious one for me is increasing the white chocolate. I know I was 25g short of the recipe but I don't feel like that much would have made the difference. I'm thinking more like 250 - 300g and reducing the cheese to compensate? (though that might not work out exact volume as the chocolate is likely denser).

Also considering a water bath? I've read a lot about them helping to avoid cracks but do they do anything that might help me achieve a creamier texture?

I've seen recipes swap between sour cream and double cream, would there be any noticeable difference if I swapped to double cream?

Also just generally thinking I could turn the oven off a bit sooner too. I think that looking at the fact that the middle hadn't risen and taking that as a sign that it wasn't done was a bad judgment.

Any other tips and advice would be hugely appreciated :)

Thanks

Stuart
 
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First of all your cheesecake still looks excellent! Unfortunately I'm not too knowledgeable about baking cheesecakes, but I'll try to offer some tips that may help.
  • First of all, overbaking definitely would make it drier and crumblier. As you've mentioned the sides being puffed but the center still sunken is actually the point at which it's done.
  • Actual recipe-wise, eggs, being a structure-builder, make for a firmer cheesecake, with egg whites having a stronger effect than egg yolks. Whites also can have more air whipped into them than yolks which would make the cheesecake lighter and probably crumblier (think of Japanese-style cheesecakes, which are made similarly to soufflés with the whites being whipped separately before being folded into the batter), but I'm not sure of how much air is actually whipped into eggs during the mixing process for cheesecakes and whether this factor makes a big difference. Regardless, having more yolks vs. whites makes for a denser cheesecake.
  • I'd heard that sour cream makes a denser (and probably creamier) cheesecake than heavy cream, but not too sure on that, and I know that double cream is thicker + higher fat % than heavy cream in North America.
While we're on the subject of cheesecake, another thing you could try it baking at a very low temperature. With the browned edges on the restaurant's cheesecake, it doesn't look like they baked it super low temp, but it might be something to try out. Here's an informational post I like from reddit on the benefits of baking cheesecake at low temps; even though the reasons outlined in it aren't directly related to your post, they may help you with cheesecakes in general: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskCulinary/comments/hnqaou/_/fxeyvie
 
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Hey @Cahoot thanks for the reply!

Yeah it looks fine, tastes good, it's just not what I was going for.. I'm my own worst critic haha

I definitely think I overbaked it now. It threw me a bit because I'd watched some videos on YouTube and many of them showed the cheesecake rising evenly in the oven. So when mine only rose around the edges I took that as a sign that it wasn't done, maybe that's not the case? or maybe it was a sign that it wasn't cooking evenly? Our oven does tend to sit a bit hot sometimes, I keep meaning to buy an oven thermometer. Maybe next time I should just bake it for 45 mins then stop regardless of wobble? I'll try a water bath too to help it bake more evenly.

I think I'll stick with sour cream this time then, I don't want to change too many variables at once.

Do you think I should consider less egg then? or at least less white?

Interesting post about the super low temps, but yeah, as you point on, the one in the first photo has browned edges so its probably unlikely that theirs was super low?
 
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Hey @Cahoot thanks for the reply!

Yeah it looks fine, tastes good, it's just not what I was going for.. I'm my own worst critic haha

I definitely think I overbaked it now. It threw me a bit because I'd watched some videos on YouTube and many of them showed the cheesecake rising evenly in the oven. So when mine only rose around the edges I took that as a sign that it wasn't done, maybe that's not the case? or maybe it was a sign that it wasn't cooking evenly? Our oven does tend to sit a bit hot sometimes, I keep meaning to buy an oven thermometer. Maybe next time I should just bake it for 45 mins then stop regardless of wobble? I'll try a water bath too to help it bake more evenly.

I think I'll stick with sour cream this time then, I don't want to change too many variables at once.

Do you think I should consider less egg then? or at least less white?

Interesting post about the super low temps, but yeah, as you point on, the one in the first photo has browned edges so its probably unlikely that theirs was super low?
Rising around the edges but not the center is purely a sign of uneven cooking, but that's an inevitable part of cooking - your pan radiates heat, so the batter that's close to it will naturally cook quicker than batter that's farther (i.e. in the middle). The purpose of water baths is to alleviate this uneveness by regulating the heat from the sides (since water can't go above 100°C); as you've read baking at a low temperature accomplishes the same thing too. It's likely that the videos you saw use one of those techniques.

I always recommend buying an oven thermometer. Home ovens are notoriously terrible and usually off. Additionally they take longer to preheat and stabilize at that heat than most people realize - I usually preheat for a minimum of 20 minutes. Plus oven thermometers are so cheap, so if you're gonna go through the effort of trying to perfect this recipe, might as well get one.

Something else to consider is that since you're using a 7" pan while the recipe calls for an 8", your cheesecake is taller than the original recipe, and hence will bake more unevenly. So it'll help to use one of the methods above to help cook more evenly. Yes it doesn't look like the restaurant baked theirs at a very low temperature, but I'm not too sure if I can recommend using a water bath with springform pans just because of all the potential issues you can face (leakage, accidental unclamping, having to wrap completely with aluminum). If you don't particularly care about a browned top, then a low and slow bake would be the most foolproof method.

I don't recommend baking using only time as a guideline. As I mentioned with how home ovens are so unreliable, the required time to bake things can vary drastically between ovens, so using your eyes, or even better a thermometer, are the best ways to evaluate when it's done baking. If you do own a thermometer, it's the most fool-proof way to consistently achieve the same degree of doneness each time, which will help to control for that variable when you're recipe testing. And once you're familiar with the visual cues of the given temperature, you can just rely on your eyes instead of taking the temperature if you desire. I think I've seen the 145-150°F (63-66°C) range used for different recipes, but of course it depends on your recipe.

About the visual cues, since I don't have much experience with cheesecakes I won't pretend to be an expert, but in general with custards, they'll still wobble in the center when they're done baking, you just want it more to wobble together like Jello instead of sloshing about like waves. Since you're letting it cool very slowly still in the oven, it will continue cooking and setting up. And since you're going for a creamier texture, you'll probably want to err on the lower internal temperature range.

I'd be hesitant about changing the amount of eggs right now, but it's still something to consider. I know that dark and milk chocolates are considered structure-builders due to their cocoa solids nonfat, so if you were adding more of them into a formula you could decrease the structure-builders (e.g. flour, eggs) elsewhere. However since white chocolate doesn't contain any cocoa solids nonfat, it just has the cocoa butter, I'd be inclined to guess it doesn't have a big effect on the structure of the cheesecake. So if you did want to mess around with the ratios of the ingredients, you may be able to increase the amount of white chocolate without changing anything else.

If we did want to reduce the quantity of eggs, if we assume 50g per egg (from what I've found, Australian large eggs might weigh a bit less than that excluding shell, but it won't be a big deal here), with 20g per yolks and 30g per white, then in the recipe we have something similar to 60g egg yolks and 90g egg whites. To not make any too drastic changes, maybe you could decrease the egg whites by 20-30g (2/3-1 egg white) and see how it goes.

Another thing about increasing the intensity of the white chocolate flavour is that since white chocolate doesn't contain any cocoa solids nonfat, most of the white chocolate flavour is actually vanilla. I noticed the recipe only uses 1 tsp vanilla extract. Try increasing it to 2-3 tsp, but I don't know if you want to do more than that since it might just start tasting bitter instead of more vanilla-y. If you have a good quality vanilla paste, maybe that could help contribute a more intense vanilla flavour.

If I were to make any further guesses about how to make a cheesecake creamier, I'd think that increasing the dairy (in this case sour cream) would help. However as you've mentioned, you don't want to change too many variables at once when recipe testing, and I won't pretend to be more knowledgeable than I am so I can't say definitively whether it'll be a good idea or not.

So right now, I'd recommend:
  1. Bake at lower temperature or use water bath.
  2. Don't overbake.
  3. Increase amount of white chocolate
  4. Maybe decrease amount of eggs or egg whites.
To end off, I assume you're using full-fat cream cheese and aren't overmixing the batter? You want it mixed enough to not have any lumps, but continued mixing will just aerate the batter and make it bake up lighter, which isn't your goal.
 
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Thanks @Cahoot for another very detailed response!

All good points. Yes I'm using full-fat cream cheese and I'm only mixing enough to incorporate the ingredients. I'm mixing by hand too where many others use a electric mixer so I'd be surprised if I'm overmixing it.

I had another attempt today. I googled the chocolate I used and some people complained about that particular brand lacking flavor so I decided to swap to the good old trusty cheap supermarket stuff that's never let me down haha. I also ramped it up to 300g, It might be overkill but my thinking was that if it's too much, then I know the sweet spot is about half way, where as if I went 250g and it wasn't enough, I wouldn't know if 300g was enough until I tried that too. I also reduced the cream cheese to 400g purely because I was worried about volume in the tin. So this one could well be too sweet but we'll see :)

I dropped the temp from 150c to 140c (Fan assisted oven) and baked using a water bath for about 50 minutes instead of the 60 that I went with last time. It definitely cooked a LOT more evenly, there was no dip in the center this time. I went slightly against my judgement and turned the oven off with no browning on the top and left it to cool. Just from the look alone, it looks better, it looks smoother, the top is flat but firm and there's (almost) no browning. I really struggle with the wobble test.. it always wobbles :p. But I think it's okay, only time will tell.

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Unfortunately.. when I took it out of the pan I realized that water had gotten into the tin (you called it) :(. I covered it in foil and there were no holes so I've no idea how it got in, hopefully its just the biscuit, in which case it might dry but I'll have to see. The water bath definitely helped though so I'm keen to make that work.

I'll update you when I cut into it.
 
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Hmmm, now I feel like I might have under-baked it and I'm a bit nervous about eating it considering it has raw eggs in it. The good news however is that it looks like the water damage was minimal and didn't get very far into the biscuit base.

The texture of this one came out totally different. There's a kind of a "rubbery" skin on top but the rest of it is a bit too soft for my taste, like buttercream (see the final image).

I still think the taste of the cream cheese overpowers the chocolate a bit which is also frustrating. The one in the restaurant must not have used Philadelphia.. unless its actually the sour cream I'm tasting? maybe I need to swap that with double cream and see what happens.

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I definitely think the water bath was a good move, however it clearly take a bit longer to bake so maybe I should have given it at least the full hour. It's soo hard to tell when its done :/

Whatever the case.. I'm not there yet :(
 
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@S7ewie Don't worry, it often takes professionals many attempts to replicate a recipe until they're happy with it, so don't be too discouraged that you're not there yet. Some good things to note are that it's visibly much more evenly baked (notice how flat the top is?) and it looks like the crumbliness was caused purely by overbaking.

How exactly was the texture? From the looks of it, even if it might've been slightly underbaked, it also looks much creamier. Would the texture have been on par with the restaurant's cheesecake if it was cooked just a bit longer?

I highly recommend using a thermometer (if you have one) to check the internal temperature of the cheesecake while you're still testing and not too familiar with the visual cues. If you don't have one, then I guess your solace is that you've now seen the visual cues of when the cheesecake is overbaked and when it's underbaked, so you know to look for something in between.

It's very likely the combined tang from the cream cheese and sour cream are overpowering the white chocolate. Replacing the sour cream with double cream would definitely be a good next step in replicating the desired flavour. I don't think the brand of the cream cheese would make much of a difference taste-wise, and due to differences in composition of the cheese, I've heard of recipes developed using the Philadelphia brand not working as well when using another brand. Unfortunately I can't say how high you can push the amount white chocolate in the batter, or what adverse effects it'd have on the structure.

A possible cause for the rubbery top is that since fan-assisted ovens emit higher heat from the top, it causes the top of the cheesecake to cook more than the rest and hence the eggs coagulate more and cause the rubbery texture. Is it possible to disable the fan setting? Otherwise, I'd try out decreasing the overall temperature or tenting the top with aluminum partway through.

Speaking of the baking itself, did you cover the entirety of the tin with one piece of aluminum, or did you have to overlap multiple pieces? If you overlapped the foil, then water will get in through the small space between the pieces. You'd need the extra-wide aluminum that can cover the entire base+sides of the pan with one piece.

It still seems like you're making good progress. However, I can understand the frustration in still not being happy with the results after all the efforts, time, and ingredient costs spent so far. I apologize for not being an expert myself so I can't help more than right now, but I'll still offer my two cents on any updates if you need 'em :). Otherwise if you can't find any other responses here, you could try asking for advice on other baking & pastry forums - I know of eGullet, ChefTalk, and Reddit also has a couple related subreddits you could post on. Hopefully an actual professional will be able to give some advice that I'm missing!
 
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This is my go to White Chocolate Cheesecake recipe. It is always firm smooth and you can taste the white chocolate. I do use a water bath. Make sure you double your foil around your springform pan to avoid leakage.

(Uses imperial measurements)

Crust:
1/3 cup butter, melted
1 1/4 cups graham cracker crumbs
1/4 cup sugar
or (for a sweeter crust)
2 cups ground Danish Butter Cookies
1/4 cup butter

Filling:
3 (8 oz.) pkgs. cream cheese, softened

1 (14 oz.) can Sweetened Condensed Milk

2 cups (12 oz. pkg.) White chocolate chips

4 large eggs

2 tsps. vanilla extract

Directions
HEAT oven to 300 degrees F.

Combine butter, graham cracker crumbs and sugar in medium bowl. Press onto bottom of ungreased 9-inch springform pan.

BEAT cream cheese in large bowl with electric mixer until fluffy. Gradually beat in sweetened condensed milk until smooth. Add remaining ingredients, mixing well. Pour into prepared pan.

BAKE 65 minutes or until center is set. Cool to room temperature. Chill thoroughly. Garnish as desired.
 

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