No-Bake Lychee Cheesecake

An affair to remember :)
I made this lychee cheesecake because I missed home. I missed a little wine boutique tucked in a corner up a sloppy hill not far from home. They sell wine (of course) and serve delicious cheese and obnoxious red meat that you'd naturally expect from such an establishment. At the end of the night, they send you home delicately with a chilled lychee cheesecake. Sublime is the only one word I can think of to describe the experience. Oh what a night...

It has been too long since I last visited so I can't say for sure if this tasted anything like it but I can assure you that lychee and cream cheese are best friends forever. The burst of freshness will take you by surprise and the chilled tangy cream wraps up the affair on such perfection that you yearn for more (and dreams of it fondly after)!

Happy birthday Christina!
My craving was impatient for lychee season so I used canned ones instead and what I love about this recipe is that it's light and not too sweet (only approximately ⅛ cup sugar) thus letting the lychee-taste shine through. And it's no-bake, just freeze! But of course as with all cakes, I happened to lack the ability of reading instructions. Period. See cautionary note in recipe :) Sorry I didn't convert measurement to US metrics either!

Ingredients
Cheesecake base
  • 70g digestive biscuits
  • 30g butter, melted
Lychee Cheese
  • 250g cream cheese 
  • 150g whipping cream
  • 120g lychees
  • 50g hot water
  • 35g caster sugar
  • 8g gelatin (about 1½ tsp)
Fills a 6-inch springform pan
Adapted from Yue's Handicrafts

Directions
  1. Break the digestive biscuits in pieces and give it a few good pulse in a grinder or do it the old fashion way by sealing the biscuits in a Ziploc bag and use a rolling pin to crush it 
  2. Spread the butter evenly on biscuit crumbs and press it to the bottom of the springform pan. Set it to chill in the fridge
  3. Dissolve the gelatin in hot water and set aside
  4. Roughly chop up lychees or puree it to less visible chunks in a blender and set aside
  5. Whisk the cream cheese and sugar until smooth and add in lychee chunks
  6. Whip the cream to soft peak and gently fold in the cheese mixture. Remember to fold or the cheesecake will end up looking like Emmental, which is what happened to me the first round! Fail. And to think no baking was involved...
  7. Lastly fold in the gelatin and pour into the springform pan on top of the chilled crust
  8. Set to chill in the fridge for at least 4 hours (or preferably overnight)
I was rather obsessed with this cake so I made it twice this week, once to serve as dessert after seafood paella and another time for Christina's birthday :)

Tags: dessert