Hi. I've tried making a recipe for a Pomegranate Basque Cheesecake, but I have failed it. I believe the culprit would be me, as I didn't reduce the Pomegranate "juice" that I added to the cheesecake to remove as much water as possible, and therefore it became really moist and just crumbles when trying to move it (that's where the cracks in the images come from, it broke when i tried to move it to a plate out of the spring pan base, so I just left it there instead).
Anyways, it's possible that it would've worked if I reduced the juice. The juice is just 1 pomegranate with 200g of sugar in a jar left for a day, mixing once in a while. It does drop a lot of water so I should've done what I did for the topping and reduced it to be more of a syrup.
Here's the recipe for those interested, I also didn't notice recipes added flour/cornstarch, so you may want to add that too:
Failed Pomegranate Basque Cheesecake that didn't turn out very Basque
Syrup
- 1 Big Pomegranate
- 200g sugar (7oz?)
- Put on a jar, mix and wait 24 hours, Mix with a spoon once every couple hours or so to move the sugar around and dissolve it more
Topping
- 1 Big Pomegranate
- 125g Sugar (4.4oz? I actually added a bit more, ~140g by mistake)
- Put on a jar, mix and wait 24 hours, Mix with a spoon once every couple hours or so to move the sugar around and dissolve it more
Cheesecake (I've used every ingredient at room temperature)
- Preheat oven to 230ºC (google says it's 446ºF)
- Paper underneath 23cm/9inch pan
- Blend 250g cookies (I've used digestive oat cookies), add 80g melted butter, mix it together and spread put on the base
- Add Cream Cheese 540g (19oz?) and Blend/Mix until it's smoother?
- Strain the syrup/juice of 200g sugar (place it in a container, of course, don't let it out the drain)
- I tried blending the seeds but didn't really provide much more because they didn't blend well, they harsh
- I recommend trying to reduce the syrup in medium/low heat for a while to reduce the water content, as otherwise it might just end up like mine, falling apart like my life
- Add vanilla extract + lemon juice, 1tsp each
- Add 50g (1.7oz?) sugar (maybe not needed, it was quite sweet) and a pinch of salt (I just threw a random very small amount), and the syrup slowly, blending until they're mixed
- Add egg one by and one and slowly mix (I mostly used the spatula here besides for breaking the yolk up) until combined, 3 total
- Add 200ml heavy cream and mix until combined (used spatula as well)
- Pour on the base, place on preheated oven for 25mins 230ºc
- Remove, cool down a bit, put in fridge overnight
Topping
- Reduce topping (125g sugar one) on a stove, makes it a bit thicker, will thicken as it cools (this is what I should've done for the other one before adding it to the cheesecake)
- Cooldown
- Remove pan from cheesecake (or keep it if it's crumbling like mine), put topping on top, back to fridge
- Serve after a couple hours I guess, I waited overnight because I was busy
This is what I've done. If anyone has any tips, feel free to give them! Also, again, I added the 200g sugar juice without reducing it, so it had quite a bit of water, and that's likely what made the cheesecake turn out the way it did. Possibly, idk much about baking.
I served it with vanilla ice cream and whipped cream topped with the seeds that were on the jar. Greek yogurt may be nice as well but I don't like greek yogurt so.