Baked Lemon Coconut Cheesecake Slices with Chocolate Chips

One of our colleagues in the team will be going overseas for 6 weeks... A trip to Canada and the States, river cruise...  Lucky him.


So we had a morning tea and we are bringing something to work.  I made this because it's easier to cut into slices and bring just enough to the office, rather than the whole cake - cheese cakes are usually filling and we only have a small team, not even people to finish the whole cake.  I used the lamington tray and that's just right for this recipe...


I normally make baked cheese cakes, not chilled, not sure why? I think I'm just used to the baked cheese cakes.  I've made so many different cheese cakes in my baking life so I didn't use any recipes from the books, so it's just something I put up together, well, almost.  I couldn't find the chocolate ripple biscuits I thought I had, so instead of the chocolate biscuit base I thought I'd use, I end up having to make a chocolate short crust pastry base, so I referred to my trust worthy Le Cordon Bleu pastry and tarts cook book, a simple book with all the pastries and basic techniques.  A bit of alteration, of course.


Baked Lemon Coconut Cheesecake Slices with Chocolate Chips


Base:
200g Plain Flour
50g Icing sugar*
25g dark cocoa powder*
1 pinch of salt
1 egg
100g butter


Crumb cold butter into the mix of flour, cocoa, salt and icing sugar until it resembles bread crumbs, add in lightly whisked egg and form a rough dough.
Chill in fridge covered with glad wrap and set for half an hour to one hour.
Roll out into the rectangle shape of the lamington tray, in between baking paper (using enough to be able to fold over to cover) and blind bake with weights in 190C oven for 30 minutes(I use rice because I accidentally bought some very yukky rice, that will only be suitable for using as weights – bye bye Jasmine).

*Note, the original Le Cordon Bleu recipe specified white sugar with no specified amount, and cocoa powder was added by me to make sure it's a chocolate cookie base.

Fillings:


250g cream cheese
250g clotted cream
200g thick vanilla yoghurt
2 eggs
¾ cup shredded coconut
¼ cup dark chocolate chips.
1/3 cup fine almond meal
Zest of 1 lemon (I have lemon myer at home)
½ cup sugar


Beat cream cheese, clotted cream and thick vanilla yoghurt till creamy. Add in sugar and mix well. (use bench top mixer, it’s easier and I can still dance around getting rid of all the sugar I spilled on flour while it’s mixing everything quietly!)
Beat in the eggs, one at a time till creamy.
Add in coconut, and almond meal, mix well.
Zest the lemon (Thank God for the new Breville’s bench top mixer, I can zest the lemon whilst it’s mixing quietly, how wonderful…. It’s nice and smooth)
Finally, fold in the dark chocolate chips with spatular (hmm, it’s the time not to use the mixer, unless you don’t want chunky chocolate bits)
Bake in 190C oven for 40 minutes, cool (in the tray, don’t take out.. must always remind myself, I have had one cheese cake disaster during my baking life, forgot it was a cheese cake and stupid enough to do the skewer test, end up totally burning the whole thing, not any more. Cheese cakes, especially baked cheese cakes….. should be a walk in the park)

And chill in fridge for 4 hours or more before cutting into slices…