Perfect Macha Cheesecake

A couple of months ago I was obsessed with all things macha (greentea) and after hours searching Google for macha cake recipes, I settled on one which I have gradually changed, using less sugar and eggs and omitting the lemon completely. The result is a light, soft, subtle cake that is great with a scoop of vanilla ice-cream, or just as good on its own.


Yi's first attempt!!! Sooooooooo GOOD!

Macha Cheesecake

140 g fine sugar
5 eggs, separated
1/4 t cream of tartar
2 t macha powder
50g butter
250g Phil. creamcheese
100 ml fresh milk
60 g cake flour
20 g cornflour
pinch of salt

1. Set/preheat oven at 160 C, line bottom of 8" round caketin with baking paper.
2. Put the cheese, butter and milk into a small pot and melt over a double boiler.
Use a small whisk to blend till smooth. Do not over-cook. Remove from heat and let cool. Mix in the macha and salt.
3. Using an electric mixer, beat whites with sugar and cream of tartar till stiff.
4. Sieve the flours into the cheese mixture, add the yolks, fold quickly to mix well, then mix the whites into the cheese mixture quickly with your hands. Pour the batter into the tin and
bake bran marie at 160 C for 1 hour 10 min.
5. Remove cake from oven and turn cake out
immediately onto a wire rack to cool or it'll shrink too much. Chill before serving.

Note: Once, I was out of fresh milk so I used soy milk and couldn't tell the difference. You can sieve some icing sugar over cake, or pipe on some fresh cream rosettes.

Note 2: Two readers have informed that their macha cheesecake turned out wet, and I myself had the same result early this year when I got a new oven. I think you need to crank up the heat if your oven is generally cooler; not all ovens are the same heat at the same setting so you have to know your oven. I would suggest that those who got wet cake turn their ovens up to 170/180 C or bake it another 15 min. or so. Hope that works.