How do these projects start? Typically from someone’s Instagram posts and … I started testing the recipe at school because I had some extra ube leftover. Then I came across some pandan leaves in the freezer…one thing led to another, and I have been testing this recipe multiple times a week for the past week. Now that pandan is finished, we will double back to finalize the ube version. After that, I have plans for Thai tea, coffee, chocolate, … This will be the summer of Basque!

Basque Cheesecake originated in San Sebastien. It is an adaption of traditional cheesecake, cooked at a high baking temperature that creates a contrast in texture between the outside and the just barely set interior. Typically, it is served as-is without any cookie crunch, fruits or lighted cream, but may be paired with a glass of sherry. The mark of a Basque cheesecake is the signature burnt top and soft center. It uses just about 5 ingredients, one of which is often flour. We opted out of the flour, and the results are pretty good (though we might tweak it to include flour for a blind taste testing comparison with the kids someday).

Ingredients:

• 500g cream cheese
• 160g sugar
• 5g pandan extract (1 tsp)
• 165g eggs (3 large)
• 170g heavy cream
• 30g coconut paste
• 10g pandan juice

Tools Required:

• small pot (5L)
• stainless steel bowls
• spatula
• strainer
• stand mixer fitted with paddle attachment or blender
• 9″ fluted pie plate (with removable bottom) lined with parchment

Instructions:

1. In a stand mixer fitted with a paddle or a blender, add cream cheese and sugar and mix until smooth.
2. Blend eggs in, one at a time, scraping the sides after each addition.
3. Add the remaining ingredients and mix/blend until a smooth batter is achieved.
4. Strain the mixture to remove any clumps (and eliminate bubbles).
5. Pour the mixture into a 9″ fluted pan lined with parchment paper.
6. Bake at 240°C/465°F for 18-20 minutes.
7. Let cheesecake sit at room temperature for an hour, then place in refrigerator for a min. of 4 hours, preferably overnight. Enjoy!

Variations:

• Sprinkling sugar on top gives an extra caramelization and crunch.
• Ube Replace pandan extract and juice with ube extract and the coconut puree with ube puree.
• Thai tea. Replace pandan extract, juice and coconut puree with 35% for a total of 215g heavy cream. Infuse the heavy cream with with 1/4 cup (25g) of Thai tea leaves. Note: Measure more heavy cream than you need (roughly 325g) since some of it will be lost when you are straining the tea leaves.
• We also tried using a 6″ springform, the baking time was roughly 24-25 minutes.

FAQs, Tips, Troubleshooting:

• Leftover fiber from the pandan leaves were infused into the cream to extract as much flavour as possible.
• For best emulsion, all ingredients should be at room temperature.
• You can refrigerate your base for a few days, please note that your baking time will be different since your base has had time to chill.
• For the cheesecake to be baked properly, you are looking for an internal temperature of 150 to 155ºF (65.5 to 68ºC).
• If you reach the internal temperature but the top is NOT baked to your desired colour, you can broil it (or use a torch) for a minute or two more. Be sure to remove the cake from the oven and preheat the broiler in this case — leaving the cake in the oven for too long will overcook the center and spoil the texture of the interior.