192/656 - Honey cheesecake

Oh deary me, I could get very, very fat just from the mere fact that I am now aware of the existence of this recipe. 

Honey cheesecake sounds innocent enough. But put together a light and fluffy body, a sweet sugar cinnamon topping and a lovely home-made shortcrust pastry and you have a dessert that can (and did) disappear in record time. 

There was a moment in time, believe it or not, that I did not think I would have a cheesecake to put on the table! This recipe was supposed to contain full cream cottage cheese and I went on a last minute dash for ingredients just prior to cooking. This of course meant that my choice of cheese was confined to the selection available at my local. I could not believe my eyes when I realised that the 8 different brands of cottage cheese on the shelf were ALL low fat! Worried that I was dooming my cheesecake before the pastry had even been blind baked, I nervously picked up the creamiest looking one and hoped for the best. 

Things did not get better when I combined the ingredients for the filling. The result looked more like churned milk than the smooth cream Stephanie described. A little bit of cursing may have followed this step. Muttered under my breath and out of the earshot of children, but there were definitely bad, worried words. 

I gingerly sprinkled my cinnamon sugar mix over the top of the wobbling liquid and put it in the oven hoping for the best. I had a fair idea the filling would get there in the end when I felt the edges beginning to firm up, but was aware that this was likely to take much longer than the allotted 30 minutes. Some foil over the top prevented my lovely pastry from burning to a crisp while I patiently waited for my soup to turn into a cheesecake.  

Success! The cheesecake firmed up, although it did swell rather alarmingly on one side. Thankfully it flattened out before I took it to the table, and the result was so lovely and light I am wondering if the low fat cottage cheese may have been a blessing in disguise!