Not Quite Martha's!

Strawberry Marble Cheesecake!

I had fun and panic doing this yesterday! I had looked for fresh raspberries last week, but to no avail, and I forgot about the frozen ones! Anyway, yesterday as I started taking out my bowls and ingredients, I realised I had strawberry conserve, instead of raspberry! I couldn't turn back or run to get raspberry conserve as the digestive biscuit base were already in the oven, ha ha!! So, strawberry it was!!

And, the verdict after all the running and feeding Muhammad and screaming at Umar and Ibraheem because they wanted to have the cream cheese batter RAW......a velvety smooth tangy cheesecake....akin to The Loaf's Uhu Hu's Strawberry Cheesecake, voila!

Here's the recipe, of course already tweaked by me!

Strawberry Swirl Cheesecake

2 cups finely ground digestive biscuits, Martha's was just 1 cup

6 tablespoon butter, melted, I used salted butter, Martha's was just 3 tbsp

11/2 cups sugar

200 g strawberries, I used 170g strawberry conserve and added 30ml water and blitz in a food processor and pass through a fine sieve

900g cream cheese

a pinch of salt

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

4 large eggs

juice of about half a lemon, Martha's didn't have this

1. Preheat oven to 170C. Line standard muffin tins with paper liners, I used a medium paper liner, no 8. Stir together ground digestive biscuits and melted butter. Press 1 tablespoon crust firmly into the bottom of each lined cup. Bake until set, about 5 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

2. Process the strawberry conserve and liquid, pass through a fine sieve. I omitted sugar as I used conserve, otherwise if you are using fresh strawberries, add 2 tablespoons sugar.

3. Using an electric mixer on high speed, beat cream cheese until fluffy, scraping down sides of the bowl as needed. With mixer on low speed, add 1 1/2 cups sugar in a steady stream, add salt and vanilla until well combined. Add eggs one by one until well incorporated, do not over beat at this point!

4. Spoon 3 tablespoon filling over crust in each cup. Dollop 1/2 teaspoon strawberry puree in a few dots, and using a toothpick, swirl the puree into the filling. Place each tin in a roasting pan, pour enough hot water into the roasting pan to come to three quarters of the way up sides of the cups. This is to prevent the cakes from sinking when baked.

5. Bake for about 25 to 30 minutes. Carefully remove tins from the water bath and let cool completely and chill in the fridge for at least for hours before removing from the tins. Mine couldn't wait that long, Ibraheem, Umar and moi were waiting anxiously! Altogether I made 32 medium cheesecakes and one 6x6 square casserole cheesecake for the family. The minis were given to friends and neighbours to taste!