Cheesecake Calamity

Due to the fact that I can rarely restrain myself around a cheesecake, this week I decided to try a recipe for a lighter low-fat version that came in my latest edition of Delicious Magazine. As this interesting recipe involves mixing cottage cheese and yoghurt and then draining them in a muslin-lined sieve overnight, I thought it would be a new, fun thing to try, while protecting my waistline at the same time. Hmmmmm. I have had lower-fat cheesecakes before that are very nice so I hoped that this one that was so beautifully illustrated in 'Delicious' would be tasty and saintly all at the same time.

So I blended the cottage cheese and yoghurt and left it in the muslin-lined sieve overnight as instructed. So today while combining the resulting cheesey-solids with egg, vanilla essence, stem ginger, lemon juice, pecans and a bit of sugar, it all looked very promising. tasted ok too. Alas, this optimism was rather premature. I manufactured a base out of 'light' cereal bars all blended up into a rather sticky concoction. Then in with the cheesecake cheesey filling and into the oven for 45 mins. All still appeared well and even when I opened the door after the allotted 45 minute cooking time the cheesecake looked browned and plump and rather nice really. So I left it in the oven with the door ajar as directed in the recipe, and returned to my glass of wine and 'How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days'. When I returned to the oven an hour or so later, the pretty, plump cheesecake I had left there had sunken into a rather less-promising looking version of its former self. I tried to recall how much my last baked cheesecake (which was amazingly good) had sunken after it came out the oven, and although I know they always sink a bit, this looked like rather a lot and not just 'a bit'. But, I was not to be disheartened (as I am home alone the cheesecake is my only friend tonight and I did not want to give up on it), so I cut myself a piece and dug in. It is quite hard to describe what it was like really. If you imagine a marriage of quiche, cottage cheese and yoghurt, not sweet and not savoury, but on some kind of previously unknown parallel dimension somewhere in between, that may give you an idea. An interesting and altogether new experience for my tastebuds. I am only sorry that I do not have a dog who in his unrestricted culinary tastes would appreciate it, and as I don't think that there is a human being on the planet who would want it, this experiment is sadly destined for the bin. It was not a totally wasted endeavour though, I now have myself 1.5m of muslin which I sourced from the John Lewis haberdashery department (for a fraction of the price of their special (tiny!) jam-making muslin squares in the cooking department!), and that will come in handy in the future I am sure.

Theres a first time for everything and tonight was my night for flopping cheesecake. I didn't even know that such a thing was possible. Teehee :) Well off to a hot bath with a book and glass of red to soothe my cheesecake-traumatised soul.