Cheesecake: Intermission Reflections

In terms of the filling, I feel that maybe I have reached the pinacle of the recipe that I have been using. Frankly, I am not satisfied. It is good, but it is not great. It is a tofu pie posing as a cheesecake. The quest is not over.

I was thinking about increasing the cream cheese to a full container and playing around with the texture by using the freezer. The plan was to make three small crustless cheesecakes: one made with previous frozen the pressed tofu; one that is frozen once it is made, and then thawed; and one control cheesecake following the recipe that I have used to this point. This will happen at some point in the name of science!

My mom and I used to make amazing New York style cheesecakes for showers. It occurred to me that attempting to veganize her recipe might be a worthwhile, if not expensive, endeavor.

I decided a few days ago that the next time I am with someone who orders dairy cheesecake, I will ask for a bite. (Ethically, I feel that I am not doing anything that leads to animal suffering and I will save my friend some calories. I will get indigestion, but I will gain insight into the art of cheesecake.)

It was a friend's birthday today, and we did cake at a local cafe. Everyone ordered cheesecake, so I had a bite of a creme brulee cheesecake, a caramel brownie explosion cheesecake and a blueberry cheesecake. When I got home and saw the remaining sliver of cake two, I grew angry. The flavour and texture are still both light years away from the deliciousness of dairy cheesecake. I know that the flavour of meat substitutes is probably not nearly as satisfying as real meat, but I feel it should be more possible to realistically imitate dairy.

Determined to improve, I spent some time on the Kraft Canada Philadelphia Cheesecake Centre. It turns out that the recipe I have been using is not nearly the same composition as a classic dairy cheesecake. For the next attempt, I am going to bite the bullet and make a cake made almost entirely of dairy substitutes. Stay tuned...