Last night, we went to visit some friends and their new baby (a real little cutie named Camilla Lou). We took dessert and drinks, and I wanted to make something with a bit of a spring theme.
I started with the idea of something involving rhubarb since it's such a spring thing, and it didn't take too long to find this cheesecake recipe: Vanilla Cheescake
I don't make a lot of desserts, and I've always been a bit intimidated by the idea of a baked cheesecake, but this one was actually quite straightforward. It took a little time, but it was well and truly worth it. I used vanilla bean paste that I brought back from Australia (they want a king's ransom for vanilla beans here), so I got all that lovely vanilla bean flavour.
It has two layers to it; one is your classic cream cheese and eggs, and the other is yoghurt and sour cream. I ended up with a smooth, and quite delicate cheescake that wasn't too sweet.
The poached rhubarb part of it was the crowning glory, though. My goodness me that was yummy! It wasn't rhubarb from my garden, which isn't ready yet, but the store-bought stuff turned out just fine. The recipe said it would take about 20 minutes to cook the rhubarb, but it ended up being more like 50. If you try it, serve the rhubarb at room temperature so you get the full impact of all the flavours.
I read the comments about the recipe on taste.com and I have to agree; this will be my basic cheesecake recipe if ever I want to make another one. You could top it with just about anything. I'm thinking mango and lime, maybe, or berries and star anise... the possibilities are endless.
I made a baby blanket for Camilla, too, but I didn't get around to taking a photo of it. Needless to say, it's my best one yet ;)
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