Judging by the popularity of Pocky and the way anime fans seem to adore Japanese goodies, I think it’s safe to say that Japanese sweets are gaining a foothold here in America. Believe it or not the Japanese have an extensive tradition in sweets dating as far back as 300 B.C. Truly Japanese sweets are called wagashi and have their origins in Japanese traditions while Western inspired sweets are called yogashi.
Japanese desserts – like most Japanese main courses – are fairly light. Although sugar is used in Japanese desserts, it’s usually not refined white sugar. A while back I needed a dessert to bring to a Japanese themed potluck. I immediately thought of cheesecake because it just screams summer, but I knew that I wasn’t going to kill my friends by bringing a chemical laden cheesecake from a box.
So I hopped online and perused traditional Western cheesecake recipes. Dear god, the amount of cream cheese and eggs used in those recipes was enough to clog even the healthiest of arteries. Since I was hoping for something Japanese (I was going to make the cheesecake a lychee cheesecake to give it an “Asian” flavor) I searched for Japanese desserts and looky-looky, I found a Japanese cheesecake recipe!
Most cheesecakes on the market are like bricks of lard and are so rich that you want to hurl after one high caloric piece. This recipe has a fraction of the sugar, cream cheese and eggs than most cheesecake recipes but it has a rich yet light texture. It’s also more labor intense than most cheesecake recipes but it’s 100% worth the effort.
INGREDIENTS:
- 7 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
- 1/4 cup whole milk
- 1/2 cup superfine sugar (caster sugar aka baker’s sugar) This should be next to the rest of the sugars in a well stocked super market
- 3 eggs, separated
- 1/4 cup cornstarch (don’t use flour!!)
- 2 tablespoons lemon juice
- 1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
- 2 1/2 cups boiling water
INSTRUCTIONS:
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- Spray a 9-inch cake tin with cooking oil spray.
- Beat cream cheese with milk to soften.
- Add half of the sugar, all the egg yolks, all the cornstarch and all the lemon juice to the beaten cream cheese.
- Beat until smooth.
- Beat egg whites separately in a medium sized bowl until foamy. Do NOT let any grease get in the eggs whites or you’re screwed and by screwed I mean your egg whites will fail to get fluffy and peak!
- Gradually add the remaining sugar and all of the cream of tartar to the egg whites, beating on high speed until soft peaks form, about 8-10 minutes. This may seem excessive but you must get those peaks!
- Gradually fold beaten egg whites into the cream cheese mixture, stirring gently. DO NOT BEAT them into the mixture.
- Pour into cake pan and smooth the surface.
- Place cake pan into a larger roasting pan and place in lower rack of oven.
- Pour enough of the boiling water into the roasting pan to come half way up the side of the cake pan.
- Bake 35-40 minutes or until a pick inserted in the middle of the center comes out clean.
- If the surface becomes too dark while baking cover with a piece of tin foil, but be careful not to open the oven door until it has been in the oven for at least 20 minutes.
- If you can, let the cheese cake (which is a soufflé in disguise) gradually cool for one hour in the oven with the oven turned off.
- If you like, you can treat the cheesecake like its Western counterparts and spread some fruit filling on top of it. (I don’t recommend lychee as it overwhelms the cheesecake).
Japanese cheesecake is a very light, fluffy, not too sweet cheesecake with a very cheesecake-y flavour.
I like this recipe because it’s:
- Not as fattening as Western versions
- Has a rich, full flavour without being too rich
- Fluffy, and yet it’s a cheesecake…
I disliked this recipe because it’s:
- Labor intensive and time consuming
- The original instructions were confusing (hopefully I fixed that)
All in all, this recipe rocked, try it and lemme know how it turned out for you.
Difficulty: Moderate to Difficult Time: About one hour Ingredient Availability: Very Easy
@captain, this probably getting to you wayyyy too late, but yes, I think it would affect the recipe- drastically! Let us know if it turned out, however.
@smile, I’m of the “teach a man to fish-they’ll eat for a lifetime” school of thought, so check this out: http://www.onlineconversion.com/weight_volume_cooking.htm
Hi, I tried making the cheesecake today and followed all the instructions. As predicted, my cheesecake started to brown 20 minutes into the cooking time and i inserted foil 23 minutes into the baking. However, after the cake has done baking, i noticed that the cake has sank. Is it because i opened the oven door? It didn’t rise enough too! Should i not open the oven door at all? Will baking powder help?
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All ovens are slightly different with their temp settings, (I don’t care what the manufacturers say) and we sometimes need to finangle the temp accordingly. For me, that means lowering the temp and and covering the cake with foil from the get go.
It could also be from opening the door. The temp needs to stay even throughout the cooking process. One thing I read about preventing the dreaded cheesecake cave-in is to cook at a lower temp for longer and to make sure it’s fully cooked.
Since Japanese cheesecake is a hybrid souffle and cheesecake, some tips on baking a souffle come in handy.
[...] gd friend ML came to ‘borrow’ my oven to learn to bake Japanese Cheesecake for her bf on 7Feb. Supposed to be a gift for him for Valentines Day. Me as her gd friend cannot [...]
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I followed the recipe to the T. It turned out flat, did not rise at all. I beat the egg whites till it was stiff. Where did I go wrong.
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Shei, a bunch of folks have had the same problem, myself included. If you read the past comments, there’re plenty of links to pages which may help address the problem.
I tried your recipe yesterday and everyone loved it. However, I found the directions a bit confusing with respect to the egg whites. Maybe I have a super-powered mixer, but well short of eight minutes the egg whites were past the soft peak stage and were quite stiff, which I think made the texture of the cake a bit tough. I’ll definitely try again though. Thanks for posting this awesome recipe, Rachel.
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[...] I tried my hand at Japanese Cheesecake (yes, again) and this time from a new recipe. I actually really liked this one. I kinda forced it out of the oven so it shrank quite a bit. Remember, Japanese Cheesecake is actually just a souffle in disguise. Next time I’ll be more gentle and let it rest in the oven for an hour or so. The texture was slightly wet (undercooked) but really nice and fluffy. The lemon juice added a nice kick and while this recipe called for less cream cheese than previous ones, it had the cream cheesiest taste of all of my attempts. If you’d like to try it out, the recipe can be found here. [...]
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Should just bake it all the way without opening the oven. Baking any cake with egg white based, should be remembered DO NOT OPEN THE OVEN while the cake is rising. It disturb the rising process of the batter. Give it 30-40 minutes bake time. Just leave the cake and lowered the heat to avoid the upper side from burning. Let the already-baked cake rest with the oven door ajar for an hour or two. I baked these beautiful baby with 250g cream cheese, 200ml milk, 4 eggs, 8 tbs of sugar, 4 tbs cake flour, lemon juice, a bit salt to subs the tartar cream, and it turns out awesome!
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I found your website through my search for a japanese cheesecake recipe using imperial measurements. Surprisingly most of the recipes i stumbled upon used metric.
Anywho I finished baking it and sadly mine has also shrunk more than half its height from the batter. Its not as soft looking at the picture you have here, mine is moist and dense but also very delicious!
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do you have any better japanese strawberry cheesecake?
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I tried the recipe today. a bit disappointed…. cake sank more than half after turned off oven. i did leave the cake in the oven for one hour before taking it out. Not sure what went wrong. i baked it at lower temperature (160 C) for 50 minutes. anyhow, the cake was tasty, moist and dense! just love it, and will try again!!!
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