Another cheesecake? I hear you say…
I’ve been working on a perfect oil-free cheesecake recipe for so long that now, that I’ve finaly hit the jackpot, I was dying to try other flavours out. As strawberries are in season at the moment, I figured that strawberry cheesecake should be very well received. Once again, it took a few trials to get the amount of agar agar spot on as strawberries have a surprising amount of water in them, it turns out, but I’ve done it. It’s smooth, creamy, fragrant and very strawberry 🙂 . This time, I have gone for a fully fledged cake rather than cute individual cheesecakes. As you might have noticed, I like baking small and cute things. I don’t know why that is? I reckon some part of me secretly believes that having one small (teeny weeny) cheesecake is not as bad as having a slice of a big guy. I know it doesn’t make sense, but hey, I often don’t… 😉 so here is a big (ish) cheesecake for you.
20 dates / 170 g / 6 oz pitted and soaked in boiling water a few pinches of fine salt heaped 1 cup / 140 g almonds 1½ tbsp raw cacao powder (optional)
CHEESECAKE
1 cup / 150 g raw cashews (soaked overnight) 600 g / 21 oz RIPE strawberries, de-stemmed (weigh after de-stemming) 5-6 tbsp / 75-90 ml maple syrup, adjust to taste 7½ level tsp agar agar flakes* ½ cup coconut cream*, chilled (from a tin) ½ cup reduced aquafaba*
DECORATION (optional)
chocolate shavings fresh strawberries
CHEESECAKE MIXTURE
**Aquafaba – water from a can of low-sodium chickpeas or from cooking dry chickpeas at home, reduced on the stove to achieve thicker consistency.
