My cheesey tale of woe

A 'hilarious' thing happened to me a few weeks ago.

I had a severe attack of baking a cheesecake without using an oven, so in order to ease my longings, I doggedly searched for a recipe of baking a cheesecake without in need of an electric oven. After a couple of days zealous investigation, I stumbled upon a recipe from http://www.myresipi.com/ which requires a simple method of steaming the cheesecake.

Thoroughly excited and resolutely single-minded, I urged my husband to buy me the abosolutely essential ingredients needed- the cream cheese and the butter. The other ingredients were already in my cupboard. My husband, being a tactical and practical man, raised his eyebrows in question at the monstrous price of the two ingredients ("Cream cheese RM9.90 for 250g? It's robbery!"). However, I managed to soothe him by saying "Mahal giler ek. Takpe, sekali je, tak jadi tak buat lagi". And he said "Takpela, tak sedap pun abang gak yang makan" :P

And so began the day where I vowed never to steam a cheesecake again. In case you were wondering, the name of the cheesecake was called Brownies Kukus Keju Pak Sahak. After a bit of digging around I found it to be quite popular in Indonesia. As I should have known earlier, this cake was not what I had expected it to be.

Anyhow, after spending about half-an-hour of mixing and whipping the ingredients then pouring the batter into a cake pan to be steamed, it was understandable that I was in a state of excitement + jitters for the result.

And what was the result, you say?

Simple-minded non-working momma that I was, I nearly had a fit when I saw the end result was a very dense cheesey cake. Not at all the spongey-type cheese cake I was imagining about. After a bit of scratching me noggin and wrenching a few strands of hair out, I came to the conclusion that the term 'brownies' was no other than the word 'binka' in Bahasa Melayu. Haha. What that right? I've no idea.

So, in order to conclude this tale of woe, it's a good thing to do your homework before you decide to take a plunge in the unknown territory of cooking. Sekian, terima kasih.


Brownies Kukus Keju Pak Sahak (loyang 8")
Bahan A:
3 biji telur
100g gula
1 sb ovalette

Bahan B:
60g tepung gandum
20g tepung jagung
1 st garam
40g susu tepung

Bahan C:
250g Philadelphia cream cheese (gue guna cheese spread je. OK jak bah)
50g butter

Cara:

1. Ayak Bahan B.
2. Pukul bahan A hingga kembang. Masukkan Bahan B dan gaul rata dan sebati.
3. Pukul Bahan C berasingan, hingga halus dan lembut. Masukkan dalam campuran A&B tadi.
4. Tuang dalam loyang beralas dan tutup guna foil. Kukus selama 20 minit, api besar.
5. Sejukkan.

Note: Rasa lagi elok guna api perlahan, tapi make sure air dah sedia membuak. Sebab bila tinggi sangat api kek naik mendadak lepas tu turun pun mendadak. Tapi masa pun lama sket la, 30 min ke.

Update 19 April 2011: When I read this back, I cringed inwardly. Yup, I should be laughed at. I used cheese spread instead of cream cheese (or at least cheese slice for a slice cheesecake recipe) to make a cheese cake. I should be smacked on the head. But can't blame it all on me 'course I really didn't know anything at all about cheese at this time. Maybe next time I'll give this recipe some justice and see how it turns up. *shaking head regretfully*