German style cheesecake

What is so special about German cheesecake? Instead of using cream cheese, a much lighter cheese, quark, which is similar to the French fromage blanc, is used. Because quark is difficult to find in the US, I've been experimenting to find a decent substitute. I found that Greek yoghurt by Fage or by Chobani comes close to the texture and acidity of quark, and can be used as a substitute. However, when using yoghurt the texture of the cake is a little different compared to a quark cheesecake. The cake and particularly the crust are a lot softer, and some people will miss the hard crust, but there will be other cheesecake recipes posted on this blog, so you might find one that suits you.

This specific recipe for German cheesecake is very simple because it doesn't require any specific crust. Rather, all ingredients are mixed together, filled into a springform, and the crust forms during the baking process.

Ingredients:
125 g butter (1 stick)
4 eggs
200 g sugar
3 tablespoons semolina flour
1 tablespoon potato starch
1 teaspoon baking powder
1000 g quark (32 oz non-fat plain Greek yoghurt either by Fage or Chobani)
Juice of one lemon
Optional: some raisins, fresh fruit or a can of mandarins (drained and cut in half)

A large (10 inch/28 cm) springform

1. Grease springform and preheat oven to 350F (160 degrees Celsius)
2. Separate eggs. Beat egg whites until fully stiff.
3. In a separate bowl mix butter, egg yolks, and sugar. Add lemon juice, starch, semolina flour, and baking powder, and mix.
4. Add yoghurt or quark and blend until a smooth mixture has formed.
5. Carefully fold egg whites under batter.
6. Fold raisins or drained mandarin halves under the batter, fill the batter into the greased springform and bake for about 60 min or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Comments:
1. You can add all sorts of fruit to this cake. The raisins are the traditional addition, but the cake tastes great without them. Another great combination is with fresh or frozen raspberries.
2. To get some stronger taste, I had covered and soaked the raisins overnight in spiced rum.
3. I used the amount described in this recipe, but split the batter in half. To one half I added raisins, to the second half I added mandarins, and baked two cakes using small (8 inch/24 cm) springforms. With that in mind, you can easily make only half a portion of this recipe, and bake a small cheesecake (8 inch/24 cm).
4. If you miss the hard crust most cheesecakes have, you can certainly add that either using a regular crust (Muerbeteig) recipe or by using crumbled Graham crackers. 

5. The semolina flour is not essential. It adds a little texture to the cake, but leaving it out will turn this cake into a gluten-free cake. You might want to exchange the semolina flour with the same amount of potato starch as a binding reagent, though.

2014:

1. I recently made this cake again. This time I used 2% Fage Greek yogurt. It turned out even better.

2. I also made a sauce using Trader Joe's Morello cherries. These sour cherries come in a glass jar filled with sugary syrup for preservation purpose. I heated the cherries with the sweet syrup and thickened it with some arrowood starch. The warm cherries were added on top of the cheesecake just before serving.