German Cheesecake

                     German Cheesecake

I can't believe I have NOT posted a recipe yet from the german cheesecake. Oh boy, I will do now.
It's impossible to keep you guys from this. I mean, it's one of Germany's most popular cakes.
The big difference between an american and a german cheesecake is --- the cheese. Yes, americans use cream cheese. We use Quark. I assume that you don't know what that is. I explained it and how
to make quark in the "Buttermilk" recipe. If you don't want to make Quark for the cheesecake,
a full and plain greek yogurt is a wonderful substitute. But make sure its plain and has at least
10% fat. 


This is what you need:

For the dough:

- 100 gr Sugar

- 200 gr softened unsalted Butter

- 300 gr Flour

- 1 Egg


For the Filling you need:

- 1000 gr (1kg) plain full greek Yogurt or Quark 

- 100 gr Sugar

- 6 Eggs

- 1 pack of Vanilla pudding to cook (or 49 gr Corn starch and 1 TSP Vanilla Extract)

- Lemon Extract or the zest of 1 lemon

- 12 inch spring Form 


This is how you do it:

Preheat the oven to 320 degrees. In a bowl add the sugar, butter, flour and egg for the dough and kneed it with your hands until you have a smooth dough. Put it in the fridge to rest.

In the meantime, you make the filling. In a big mixing bowl add the sugar, eggs and the vanilla pudding (or mix corn starch with Vanilla extract) and mix it well with either a hand blender or
the Kitchen aid. Now add the greek yogurt and the around 1/3- 1/2 TSP Lemon extract and again,
mix it well until you get a smooth but liquidy filling.

Spray or brush the spring form well with oil/butter. Take just enough of the dough to cover the
bottom, pushing it down with your fingers. It should be around 1/4 inch. The rest of the dough,
put in clinch wrap and freeze. You can use it for another batch. Now add the filling in the 
Spring form. 

Place the cake on a baking sheet and in the preheated oven for 90 min.. When it's done, do not
remove the cake from the oven. When you see the top to be a golden color to light brown, it's
done. Turn the oven off and either, leave the door closed with the cake inside or, if your oven is cooling slower, open the door just far enough to put a wooden cooking spoon in. My oven is cooling 
pretty fast. Sometimes I put the spoon in and it's cooling even faster, making the cake fall back into
itself. The cheesecake doesn't like sudden temperature changes. It will fall into itself. It's still going
to be really good though so don't worry

Guten Appetit