Blueberry Cheesecake - Frozen or Chilled

I love love love cheese cake or curd cake or cream cheese cake... as long as it's cold and fruity and milky with a hint of lemon... mmmmh...

But specially in the summertime I don't like to bake (small kitchen + hot oven = big heat) but I still like a good piece of delicious cake, which is not heavy but very refreshing.

So I adapted a recipe from a friends recipe book (thank you blanka - your cake totally blew me away) and transferred it to gluten free and low carb.

It is deliciously refreshing and not so sweet - due to the lemon and the fresh blueberries.

Instead of sugar I used Xylitol*, with is a sugar alcohol and the cake base is made of almonds instead of short crust pastry. But it also has not to much carbs, even if made with sugar, the equivalents are also in the recipe.

It is easy to make and can be kept in the fridge for a while (if it lasts that long).

*make sure you don't let your dog eat the cake. Xylitol is very harmful for dogs!

Step 1: Ingredients and Material

What you need for the cake

Cake Base:

• 100gr ground almonds (or 150gr crashed sponge fingers instead of both almond ingredients)
• 50 gr almond flakes
• 20 gr Xylitol
• 50gr butter

The cream

• 400gr fresh blueberries
• 500gr low fat curd cheese (Quark)
• 200ml whipping cream
• 1 lemon with edible zest (for the zest and the juice)
• 100gr Xylitol (or sugar)
• 8 leaves of gelatine (approx. 12gr)

• mint for garnishing
• blueberries for garnishing
• whipping cream for garnishing

The material

• cake pan (26cm)
• parchment paper
• bowl
• mixer
• spoons
• pot
• kitchen scale
• knife

Step 2: Where to Start...

There are a lot of steps which can be done almost simultaneously, but if your making the cake on your own, you need an order - here is mine:

1. Prepare the gelatine accordingly to the description of the back of the package (mine said: soak in 4-6 tablespoons of cold water, let it set for a minimum of 10min) - set aside.
2. Cover the base of your cake pan with baking paper.
3. Measure your ingredients for the cake base and mix the dry ingredients in a bowl.
4. Melt the butter in a small pot (or the microwave) and pour it into the almond mixture.
5. Put the "dough" into your cake pan and flatten it with your hands.
6. Set it to the fridge to cool it down.

Step 3: The Fruity Part

Now comes the nice, fresh and fruity smelling part.

1. Take half of the blueberries and blend it with the xylitol, keep the other half for feeding later into the cake an garnishing.
2. Wash the lemon under hot water, dry it off and then grate the zest and press out the juice.
3. Mix the curd, the blueberries and the lemon stuff together.
4. Whip the cream until stiff (don't over whip it - you might end up with clumpy something... don't ask me why I know...)
5. Set the cream into the fridge.

Step 4: The Creamy Part

1. Melt the gelatine in a water bath until it's clear.
2. Take a few tbs from your curd batter and mix it INTO the melted gelatine
3. (DON'T do it the other way round, your gelatine will cool down immediately and you will have lumps and the gelatine won't work like it's expected to work)
4. Pour the gelatine curd batter into the rest batter.
5. Set it into the fridge until the gelatine starts to jelly (or if you don't know when this moment will be, just set it in for about 25min).

Step 5: The Folding in and Pouring Out Part

1. When the gelatine starts to jelly carfully fold in the whipping cream.
2. And the blueberries, just keep a few for garnishing.
3. Pour everything into your baking pan.
4. Cover the baking pan and set it to the fridge for at least 6 hours, or even better overnight...

Step 6: Wait Wait Wait Until Chilled...

Now comes the hard and difficult part:

• wait

• wait

• wait

Take it of the baking pan, garnish with the leftover blueberries and some mint (I didn't had mint, so I used other greens).

Enjoy the taste of summer :-)

Step 7: ...or Even Freeze It

If you like it even chillier or if you have too much cake (does this exist? too much cake?) you can also freeze the blueberry cake.

In this case make sure you separate the pieces from each other, otherwise you will end up with one big piece, which is hard to share (or the best explanation why not to share :-) )

1. Keep the cake on the parchment paper and separate the pieces.
2. cover the cake with some transparent foil to avoid to much influence from your freezer.
3. Let it freeze over night.
4. Take a knife, put it into hot water, dry it with a kitchen towel and gently cut the connected pieces.
5. Put some whipped cream on top.

Enjoy the fresh taste of frozen blueberry cream cake.