Homemade cream cheese = White Chocolate Cheesecake

Today I'm linking up with The Accidental Housewife in a housewifey type of party.  YAY!  my first ever link party!  So I'm donning my party hat and my favourite apron (made for me by my gorgeous sister-in-law) and making my favourite party cake - a white chocolate cheesecake.  This cake is easy, but so delicious.  It serves 10 or so, so it is great for birthday parties or for if you need to make a dessert to take somewhere.  This week I made it for a visit from my lovely friend Jayne and it went down a treat as usual.

 I'm sure you're now drooling at the thought, but you have a bit of work to do if you want to have a piece, but nothing too hard, I promise.

 For this cheesecake, you need 500g of cream cheese.  You can go and buy your cream cheese, but this week I tried making it with homemade cream cheese and it was even better (and soooooo much cheaper!).  So for your own cream cheese (recipe credit to Christine at Slow Living Essentials) :

Make 2 litres of yoghurt.  I use my easiyo yoghurt maker (if you don't have a yoghurt maker, you can still do this, have a look on Christine's blog, she has some good suggestions).  I mix in the jar 1 tablespoon of natural yoghurt (reserved from my last batch), 1 1/3 cups of milk powder and lukewarm water.  I then place the jar in the easiyo thermos with boiling water.  After 8 hours I have a delicious yoghurt, known in our family as "Mummy-yo".  The easiyo only make a litre at a time though, so put that lot on the fridge and make another batch.

You then need to strain the whey from your yoghurt.  I poured the yoghurt into a tea towel lined colander over a large bowl.  Once it had started to drain, I cleared room in my fridge, tied the tea towel up to the bottom of the top shelf and placed a bowl below it to catch the whey.  You need to leave it for 24 hours or so until it is well drained, don't be tempted to squeeze the tea towel, just give it the time it needs. 

That's it!  Your cream cheese is in the tea towel and you have a bowl full of why.  Don't throw the whey out, you can use it for lots of baking (I'll share my favourite whey recipes another day), just store it in the fridge.

Your 2 litres of yoghurt should have made about 700g of cream cheese, so you have enough for your cheesecake, and some to make a lovely dip for starters at your special event :)

White Chocolate Cheesecake

Base

• 1 1/2 cups of plain biscuit crumbs mixed with 1 tablespoon of cocoa 
• OR  1 1/2 cups of chocolate biscuit crumbs (eg. from chocolate ripple type biscuits)
• 100g melted butter

 Mix the crumbs and the butter and press into a 22cm springform cake tin.  Refrigerate while you prepare the filling.

Filling

• 500g cream cheese (at room temp)
• 400g (1 tin) condensed milk
• 200g white chocolate melted
• 300ml cream
• 1 tblsp gelatin dissolved in 1/4 cup boiling water
• dark chocolate for decorating (optional)

 In a large mixing bowl or bowl of your mixer, beat the cream cheese with the condensed milk.
When mixture is smooth, add the white chocolate and cream.  Continue beating (I leave the beaters going while I pour it in).
Add the gelatin mix and keep beating.
When well mixed, pour onto the prepared base.
 If you would like a chocolate swirl top, melt 100g of dark (or milk) chocolate and swirl it on top of the mixture before setting.
 Refrigerate over night.
 Alternative decorations include fruit or a little grated chocolate.
 To serve, use a knife to cut around the outside of the pan, remove from tin.

Enjoy!