4 Levels of Cheesecake: Amateur to Food Scientist

[crackling]

[upbeat music]

Hi, I'm Shane.

And I'm a level one chef.

I'm Beth and I'm a level two chef.

I'm Rory from the Institute of Culinary Education

and I'm a level three chef.

[upbeat music]

This is a nice, simple New York style cheesecake

that comes from my wife's family's cookbook.

It's easy to make and I love preparing it.

This recipe is a ricotta cheesecake.

It is my husband's absolute favorite, favorite cake.

It's absolutely delicious.

I like cheesecakes light and not so dense,

so today, I'm going to be making a European style cheesecake

which is actually a no bake recipe.

[bright music]

Okay, we're going to start with making the crust.

First thing we have to do is get this pan ready

for the cheesecake to go into,

so that it will easily come out once we unmold it.

Instead of traditional crusts, I'm going to make

and oat biscuit to place my cheesecake on.

It's a little more savory.

You have the graham cracker crust all crushed up

and ready to go.

The graham cracker layer allows for me to easily open

and release the cake from the spring form pan.

So, the first step, we're gonna add

the soft butter and the sugar.

Take some room temperature butter

and I want to get the butter all around the pan.

Now for the graham cracker crumbs.

Pouring in the butter and my cinnamon.

I'm gonna mix that all up.

What I'm looking for is a nice even consistency.

You don't want too much lumpiness.

So, we're gonna cream this together until

it's light and white.

So, next we're gonna blend the flour and some rolled oats

in the food processor.

Add some black pepper and salt.

And then, I'm gonna add my dry ingredients

into the mixer until they're incorporated.

And we're just gonna mix it until it's just combined

because we don't want to make too much gluten.

Pour the mixture over it.

Just run the crumbs along the sides and the bottom

of the pan until you get a really nice coating.

This looks good.

We're gonna chill this for 30 minutes.

So, the next step, I'm gonna gently bring it

into a ball.

Wrap it in plastic wrap and chill for 15 minutes.

After it's chilled, I'm gonna roll it out flat

roughly a quarter inch thick.

We're gonna bake this at 350 degrees

around eight to 10 minutes.

And here's your nice dusted graham cracker pan.

And once it's baked, I punch out the biscuits.

And now we have our oat and black pepper biscuit

to use as our crust.

Now, let's start working on the batter.

The first step is to separate your eggs

and this is important.

We're gonna whip our egg whites.

If you get any of the yolk into the whites ...

You're not gonna get the same aeration.

It's not gonna be as light.

I crack it a little bit.

And then, I let the egg white fall into that first bowl

And then, I move it back and forth.

And then, I deposit the yolk into the other bowl.

And unfortunately, I did get a little yolk

in with my whites,

so we gotta throw this out and start all over again.

Using my hand to catch the yolk,

the eggshell itself can be sharp

and it can puncture the yolk.

Okay, let's try this again.

Oop, did it again.

I'm gonna have to start over all over again.

Real easy.

Take three.

Very gently, more gently then I was doing before.

There's a little bit in there.

If you get a little bit in there,

take a little bit of the shell

and then scoop it out.

All right, my whites and my yolks are separated.

And now, I'm gonna beat my whites.

I'm gonna whip my egg whites,

so that we have very stiff peaks.

So what you're looking for to make sure it's done,

is that when I pull out this hand mixer,

it's gonna hold its shape.

So, we're gonna add this to the Kitchen Aid

with a whisk.

This is gonna add some richness to the cake.

It's also gonna make it lighter and a bit more airy.

It will change color.

It will go from a very deep yellow.

Now, it's very pale almost white.

Beautiful.

Put them on to the dish.

When you pick up a nice little dollop,

it stays on the spatula,

it doesn't leak back in.

So, now my whites are done

and I'm gonna move on to the yolk, cream cheese mixture.

We're actually using two different types of cheeses.

Three big nice bricks of ...

[Both] Cream cheese.

And this is a Brillat-Savarin cheese.

It's a triple cream brie style cheese from France.

So, we're just gonna scoop that out.

This cheesecake is for my husband

and he loves ricotta cheesecake.

I like using the ricotta alone

because this is what helps make the cheesecake

so much lighter than a New York style cheesecake.

I'm gonna start whipping the ricotta

while I add the other ingredients.

And in you add the ...

[Both] Egg yolks.

One at a time.

Flour.

Flour's a stabilizer.

We're gonna add some heavy cream.

Now for the good stuff.

[Both] Sugar.

Pinch of salt.

Always a pinch of salt.

Some almond extract.

Just a little bit.

And always ...

[Both] Vanilla.

What makes this cheesecake different, I think,

is that I take the zest of a whole orange

and a whole lemon.

The neat thing about these rasps,

if you do it so that it looks like it's upside down,

you don't have to get it onto the board.

It just stays right in the rasp.

A little at a time,

so it doesn't spray all over the kitchen.

And now, we take our hand mixer.

Crank it all the way up to maximum

and here we go.

Oops.

We're gonna mix this until there's no lumps.

For about two or three minutes.

The key to keeping everything in the bowl

as it turns out is to start at a lower setting

than high and then working your way up.

So it's looking nice and smooth,

so this is all ready to go.

Now, what we're going to do is fold

our egg whites into our batter.

So, Frangelico is a hazelnut liqueur.

It really brings out the flavor of the cheese.

We're going to boil this Frangelico up.

Here, I've got my egg whites.

They're ready to go in

and the important thing here is to fold them in.

Don't mix them in.

Very gently.

Be very gentle.

Don't even speak loudly when you're doing it.

All of the air that we will get from the whites,

you don't want to deflate that.

Turn it around, down and over.

This is sheet gelatin.

This will soften in cold water.

As soon as you add some heat to it,

it will melt and dissolve.

Pull this gelatin out.

You can see that this gelatin's now soft.

Squeeze out the excess.

So the Frangelico has boiled.

This gelatin's really gonna help the cheesecake set.

And once it's totally dissolved,

you're going to add it back into this egg mixture.

Now, I'm adding my cheese mixture from before

into the egg mixture.

And we're gonna mix this until it's totally combined.

All right, my batter's done.

I'm gonna go grab my chilled crust.

You can see that all of the white is not completely gone.

I don't want to mix this anymore than I already have.

My crust is set.

My batter's ready.

Let's put it all together.

This is all ready to go now.

I have these four ring molds

which I'll be placing my mixture into.

We're gonna place into a piping bag

to pipe into the molds.

Pour it straight in.

Smooth it around.

So, I'm just tapping this out to level it off,

so that when we put the glaze on it is nice and flat.

So what you want to do is ladle this in evenly

in the spring form pan on top of the crust.

I'm not worrying too much about how lumpy it is

because there's another layer going on top.

This is ready to go in the oven

for about 30-40 minutes before I put on

my sour cream final layer.

[clanking]

I'm gonna cook this in a water bath.

Once I have the pan in the oven,

I'm gonna pour boiling water around the side of the pan

until it goes halfway up.

The water bath cooks the cheesecake evenly.

Again, this is a no bake cheesecake,

so these do not need to go into the oven.

Now, I'm going to put these in the fridge for four hours,

to let them set.

While my cake is baking,

I'm gonna make the final layer

which is a mixture of sour cream and sugar.

This is gonna give the cake a sweet tang

and it's gonna almost act like a frosting.

Next, I'm gonna make a strawberry glaze.

We're gonna soak the gelatin in ice water.

While that's soaking,

we're gonna heat up some fresh strawberry puree.

Strawberries go really well with this cheesecake recipe

because it's actually a more savory recipe.

The tartness of the strawberries really cut through that.

Today, I have raspberries.

I like to use a little bit of an orange liqueur.

This gives it a little boozy hit.

And some powdered sugar because powdered sugar

more easily dissolves than granulated sugar.

All right, it's almost done baking,

but before it finishes,

we're gonna add that sour cream layer.

These cracks on the surface are totally okay

because we're gonna add this sour cream mixture

right on top.

And now we spread it with the back of our spoon.

This is gonna go back in the oven for five more minutes

to finish baking

and then, once it's done,

I'm gonna put it in the fridge to chill overnight.

So this gelatin is now soft.

I'm gonna add it to the hot strawberry puree.

Mix it until it's melted.

What I'm doing is macerating these raspberries

with the orange liqueur and the sugar.

So this glaze is ready now.

We're gonna let this cool to room temperature

and then we're gonna glaze the cheesecakes.

Okay.

The cake is done.

It's chilled overnight.

Time to serve it up.

First thing I do is run my knife along the edge.

Undo this latch over here and lift up and away.

Here, you have this beautiful cheesecake.

I always powder the top.

So, my cheesecakes have chilled for four hours

and now, I'm going to pour the glaze on them.

To level them off.

I'm gonna put these in the fridge for about an hour

so the glaze sets.

To finish it off, just put a few blueberries right on top.

Little bit of macerated raspberries right on top.

The glaze is set on our cheesecakes.

So, I brought one out to finish off.

I'm going to take one of our oat crackers as a base.

And place the cheesecake directly on top.

And I'm gonna finish off with some fresh strawberries.

The very last thing that we're going to add

to this cheesecake is some freshly cracked black pepper.

And this is my cheesecake.

[camera shutter clicking]

Here is my ricotta cheesecake.

[camera shutter clicking]

And here is my cheesecake

[camera shutter clicking]

[light music]

Time to taste.

That's great.

It's light.

This is really delicious.

The strawberries and black pepper really give it a kick.

The cracker is, gives it a really nice texture.

If you like strawberries and cheesecake,

you can't go wrong with this.

What I love about this cheesecake

is you've got the crisp of the blueberry,

the smoothness of everything in between

and then, you've got that nice, nice, nice crunchiness

of the graham cracker.

You can taste the citrus.

Definitely taste a little bit of the booze

with the macerated fruit.

This is a tried and true recipe.

I wouldn't have changed anything.

[tense music]

Let's slice in to how our three chefs

made each of their cheesecakes.

Classic cheesecake is a type of baked custard

usually made with smooth, unfermented cheese.

When a cheesecake isn't baked,

instead of being like a custard,

it's more like a dense, delicious mousse.

[tense music]

For his crust,

Shane used traditional crushed graham crackers.

He added cinnamon as a warming flavor

which compliments the graham crackers perfectly.

His crust is also fairly thick

providing support for his cheesecake

and coming in handy in slicing and serving.

You want to make sure that you don't actually

have any of that mixture seeping in

and touching the bottom of the pan.

Beth used graham crackers as well,

but not as a base.

In essence, she used them instead of flour,

so the cake wouldn't stick to the pan.

Rory used an oatmeal cookie

which was added just prior to his assembly.

It provides a crisp texture,

a hearty flavor and some visual appeal.

[tense music]

For his batter, Shane used a chiffon style mixing method

where he whipped egg whites separately

and folded them gently into the cream cheese and egg yolks.

This created a light and porous texture

to his final cheesecake.

Normally, you don't want a lot of tiny holes in your batter.

They will expand and rise when heated,

then contract when cooled and that's how cracks are formed

like the one that was in Shane's cake.

During the last five minutes of cooking,

Shane also added sweetened sour cream

which stays slightly viscous and also filled in the crack.

Shane slightly over baked his cheesecake

which removed moisture and increased its firmness.

Beth used the same chiffon style mixing method as Shane,

but added additional flavorings like vanilla extract,

almond extract and citrus zest

to give her cheesecake a pungent quality.

She also used ricotta cheese instead of cream cheese.

Ricotta's not really a true cheese

since it's actually made from whey

which is the water soluble byproduct

that occurs when making cheese curds.

Beth baked her cake in a hot water bath

which allowed for even heating

and promoted gentle coagulation

of the cheese and egg batter.

Kinda like a soft blanket all around the cheesecake.

Even though the oven is set at 375 degrees,

the water will not exceed 212 degrees

without turning to steam which takes a while

since that requires a lot of energy.

Ricotta has a higher water content than cream cheese

and the gentle coagulation of her batter

resulted in a softer cake than Shane's.

For Rory, the coagulation of his cheesecake

doesn't come from baking,

but from the gelatin that he used.

Soluble gelatin is derived from collagen,

a connective insoluble protein found in meat.

He also used a combination of cream cheese

and Brillat-Savarin which is a soft, sharp cow's milk cheese

that's fermented for two weeks or less.

The key to this cheesecake was refrigeration

instead of baking where the gelatin changed

from a soft, viscous liquid into a firm gel as it chilled.

The texture of this cake remained very smooth

almost like an ice cream.

[tense music]

Shane's simple addition of sweet blueberries

pairs well with the cinnamon in the crust

and the tangy, piquant cream cheese.

Beth's has a far more complex flavor profile.

Her raspberries that were macerated in orange liqueur

compliment the citrus zest

that was added to her cake batter.

I know this is why my husband loves this cheesecake.

They were poured over her cheesecake batter

after each piece was cut

and then dusted with powdered sugar

which counteracts any alcohol taste that might be there

from the orange liqueur.

Rory used gelatin in his topping

which solidified the sweet strawberry glaze that he made.

His final sprinkle of black pepper added a slight spicy note

that counters the sweetness of the strawberry flavors.

Whether you're making something traditional

or a little more complex,

there are plenty of ways

you can make your cheesecake stand out from the crowd.

[bright music]

Hey everyone.

Sorry I couldn't make it to this episode.

Just got a new job, so I had to take some time off.

But just know I saved you about three minutes

because all I was gonna do was cut up a piece of pancake

and put it in my cheesecake batter.

I will be back for four levels once again

and I will reign supreme as a level one chef.

[laughter]