Yogurt Cake

Adapted from Chocolate & Zucchin´s Daily Adventures in a Parisisn Kitchen,this has become a family favourite and easy enough for the toddlers to help out with. They look so cute and proud helping out the padres bake!

Ingredients:
1/3 cup vegetable oil, plus 1 teaspoon to grease pan
1 cup of plain yogurt, or vanilla flavoured in a pinch
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
juice of one lemon, optional
1 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
pinch of salt

Directions:
Pre-heat oven to 350ºF or 3/4 hot on an Argentine oven (you must live here to understand this). Grease pan including sides. Dust with flour.

In a large bowl mix yogurt and sugar, and add one egg at a time, beating. I like to follow with the lemon juice, vanilla, baking soda, baking powder than the oil. Beating in each ingredient one at a time.

Sift the flour into the above mixture then gently beat in, but do not over stir. Add batter to cake pan and bake for 20 minutes. Then check for doneness. You may need 5 to 10 minutes more depending on the caprichiosoness of your Argentine oven. Do not over bake. Let cool if you can, before eating.

Creamy Chilled Cheesecake

Ingredients:
Crust:
1 cup Graham Cracker Crumbs*
1/4 cup Sugar
1/4 cup Butter -- Melted

Cheesecake Filling:
1 each Env. Unflavored Gelatin
1/4 cup Cold Water
8 ounces Cream Cheese -- Softened**
1/2 cup Sugar
3/4 cup Milk
1/4 cup Lemon Juice
1 cup Whipping Cream -- Whipped
Strawberry Halves

Instructions:
Combine Crumbs, sugar, and margarine; press onto bottom of 9-inch spring- form pan.
Soften gelatin in water; stir over low heat until dissolved. Mix in with lemon and milk mixture, set aside.
Combine cream cheese and sugar, mixing at medium speed on electric mixer until well blended. Then blend in the lemon milk mixture. Chill until slightly thickened; fold in whipped cream. Pour over crust; chill until firm.
Top with strawberries before serving.

* So far I have not found Graham Crackers here in Argentina, but Mini Miel Galletitas have made a great substitute.

** I have substituted Casancrem and Mendicreme with great success

Once I was lazy and basically just put everything together and whipped it up. I let it set for about 5 hours, before I could not stand it anymore and just had to eat it right then and there. Well, it was not very firm and started falling apart. So I threw it into the freezer. It ended up that this cake is very tasty and refreshing frozen, especially with summer temperatures of 38ºC outside. The next time I make this cheesecake I will freeze it again.

Elodie's Chocolate Cake

You need not be a purist and only use bittersweet chocolate, semi sweet is just as good and regular butter is fine if you don't want to buy unsalted. In Argentina, all butter; manteca is unsalted unless specified.

Ingredients:
10 oz Bittersweet chocolate; chop
1 c Unsalted butter
Cut into small pieces
5 lg Eggs
1 1/4 c Sugar
5 Tbsp All purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp Baking powder
Powdered sugar

Directions:
Preheat oven to 325~F. Butter and flour 10-inch- diameter springform pan with 2-3/4-inch-high sides. Stir in chocolate and butter in heavy medium saucepan over low heat until chocolate melts and mixture is smooth. Beat eggs and

1-1/4 cups sugar in large bowl until well blended and
beginning to thicken. Sift flour and baking powder over eggs and fold in. Gradually fold in chocolate mixture. Transfer batter to prepared pan. Bake cake 20 minutes. Cover pan with foil. Bake until tester inserted into center comes out with moist crumbs still attached, about 30 minutes longer. Uncover cake; cool in pan on rack (cake will fall as it cools.) (Can be made 1 day ahead. Cover; let stand at room temperature.) Cut around pan sides to loosen cake. Release pan sides. Sift powdered sugar over cake; cut into wedges.

Blueberry Ginger Ricotta Cheesecake

It was Mr. Tango´s birthday yesterday, so I modified The Sicilian Ricotta Cheesecake and used the left over Shortbread Cookie dough for a crust and added a Blueberry Ginger Topping.

Pre-bake the Shortbread cookie dough in the bottom of pan, just press it in covering the bottom, bake for about 10 or 15 minutes on low, until the crust turns to a light golden colour. You can do this the night before to save time.

Ginger Ricotta Cheesecake:
INGREDIENTS:

* 750 g ricotta cheese
* 120 g white sugar
* 30 g all-purpose flour
* 3 eggs
* 0.6 g grated ginger
* 4 g orange zest
* 10 ml vanilla extract
* 0.8 g salt (*oops i forgot to add)

DIRECTIONS:

1. **Preheat oven to 300 degrees F (150 degrees C). Set rack in the middle of the oven. Butter and flour a *6 1/2 inch springform pan, and ***tap out excess flour.
2. Place the ricotta in a large mixing bowl, and stir it as smooth as possible with a rubber spatula. Stir the sugar and flour together thoroughly into the ricotta. Stir in the eggs 1 at a time. Blend in the vanilla, cinnamon, orange zest, and salt. Pour batter into the prepared pan.
3. Bake in the center of the oven for about ****1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours, until a light golden color. Make sure the center is fairly firm, and the point of a sharp knife inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack. It will sink slightly as it cools. Cover, and chill till serving time.

* Forgot to add the salt!

** In Argentina our ovens basically have 2 settings low and hot, I used low

*** Forgot to butter and flour pan

**** I used a Pan Dulce Spring Form Pan, which is about 6.5" and much taller. Cooking time was about 90 to 105 minutes more or less.

Blueberry Ginger Topping:
INGREDIENTS

* 250 g blueberry jam
* 75 ml water
* bit of grated ginger
* 15 mls maizena (corn starch)
* 15 mls sugar

In a small pot warm jam, ginger, water and sugar, stirring out lumps.
Add some of the warmed liquid to a cup and add maizena through a sieve, stir thoughly and add back into mixture on stove. Keep stirring until thickens...you can put in the freezer for a bit to cool down before adding to top of cake.

End result:
I was a bit worried the crust would burn in the second baking phase, sooooo I read that you could bake the cheesecake in a bath water. Well little good was that! My pan was not hermetically sealed and some water seeped in. So I dumped out the water as best I could and poured the batter back into the bowl to drain out the remaining water. The crust became a bit damp, but in the end once the baking was done everything was perfectly fine...crust and all. I found the ginger flavour did not come through in the cake, so I will try and add more the next time, but I could taste it in the blueberry topping. All together the ingredients added up to around 11 pesos more or less, pretty good considering a small cheesecake costs about 30 pesos, or 10.50 for a slice with coffee at Bonafide.