CHEESECAKE WITH SOUR CHERRY TOPPING

(Text in English is below. Türkçe tariff için burayi tiklayin)

Ingredients: (8 – 10 people)

For the bottom:

2 packages of oat cookies, grinded until fine crumbs

50 grams of butter, molten

2 spoons of milk

For the cheesecake dough:

400 grams of labneh cheese

4 eggs, egg white and yolk are separated

50 ml of sour cream

2 espresso cups of powder sugar

For the topping:

Half a kilo sour cherries, pitted

2 spoons of sugar

1.5 glasses of sour cherry juice

1 glass of water

2 spoons of wheat or rice flour

Method:

1. Preheat the oven at 160 degrees.
2. For the bottom, add the cookie crumbs and the butter and mix well. Then add the milk and continue mixing. Pour the mixture into a spring form mould (that doesn’t need to be buttered) and put it in the deepfreeze.
3. For the cheesecake dough, mix the egg whites with a pinch of salt until the mixture is like white foam.
4. In a separate deep bowl, mix the egg yolk with the cream and the powder sugar.  When mixed, add the labneh cheese and continue mixing.
5. Pour the white foam mixture into the cheese mixture and whisk.
6. Take the spring form mould from the deepfreeze and pour the cheese mixture on the cheesecake bottom.
7. Bake in the oven for at least 45 minutes in a preheated oven at 160 degrees. The top of the cake must turn into light brown colour. Check if the filling is baked well with the help of a toothpick. If not ready yet, continue baking. When ready, set it aside to cool.
8. For the topping, in a large skillet, combine cherries and 2 tablespoons sugar. Boil over high heat until liquid is thick and syrupy. It will take 10 to 15 minutes.  Set the sour cherries aside. Pour the water and the sour cherry juice into the skillet. Add the rice flour and mix well. Cook until the liquid becomes thick like pudding. Mix with the sour cherries. Set aside to cool.
9. When the cake and the topping are cool enough, top the cake with the topping. Refrigerate for at least 6 hours.

step 6

step 7

step 8 - cooking the cherries

step 8 - cooking the pudding

step 9 - cheesecake ready to be refrigrated

cheesecake with sour cherry topping

a slice of cheesecake with sour cherry topping

CHICKEN RULO STUFFED WITH CHEESE AND WALNUTS ON A BED OF GRAPE LEAVES

Ok guys, it’s been a while I know but I have been quite busy lately: family visit from Belgium, a short trip to Madrid, pilates and sporting and many other fulfilling activities… Though, I have to tell you that during this period that the efforts in the kitchen have been slackening.  I have been dining outside most of the time as well. 

Anyway, today I have something special in the menu. It’s my recipe (which I created just an hour ago, which also means that the dish plate is in the oven at this very moment when I am typing you all that) however I will have to say that the concept or the idea is something I got inspired from other dishes that I have tried. What makes it my recipe is the changes I brought to these original recipe(s) that I know. 

Let’s see how it will work! 

Ingredients (serves 2-4)

2 or 3 chicken breasts, pounded thin by the help of a meat mallet

200 grams of labneh cheese

5-6 walnuts, roughly chopped

1 desert spoon of truffle oil

2 medium sized grape leaves, soaked in boiling water for about a minute and chopped fine

8 big grape leaves, soaked in boiling water for about a minute

 

4 spoons of extra virgin olive oil

Method:

1. Mix the cheese, the walnuts and the chopped grape leaves. Add in the truffle oil.
2. Lay four of the grape leaves on a oven dish.
3. Spread this mixture over the chicken breast and roll the chicken around the filling.
4. Arrange the chicken rolls on the oven dish (make sure that the edges remain at the bottom)
5. Pour the olive oil equally on each breast
6. Cover the rolls with the rest of the leaves.
7. Preheat the oven at 150 degrees for about 10 minutes
8. Cook for 30 to 45 minutes at 150 degrees.

step 1

step 2

step 3

step 3

step 6

happy ending!!!

happy ending!!