It was a beautiful day this summer when I found all these apricots in our kitchen. Beaming in the brightest orange and red, I realized that this would be probably their last day of beauty, before they would fade. So what to do with as many apricots that barely two hands can carry? – Bake a cake, which can be a solution to many problems! Since I have been longing for a fresh cheesecake for days, I thought my apricots would be perfect to add a fruity summery taste. In one of my mother`s old cooking books, I found a recipe for a traditional cheesecake which I altered a bit to fit my needs.
- 160g flour
- 50g butter
- (pinch) salt
- 20g sugar
- 1 egg yolk
- 1 tablespoon water
- 1 vanilla bean
- 500g quark
- 3 tablespoons oil
- 200g sugar
- 2 egg yolks
- 25g starch
- 2 egg whites
First, leave the apricots in a bowl with hot water and subsequently rinse with cold water to peel of the skin of the fruits. Cut the apricots in halves and remove the cores.
For the dough: Pour the flour into a bowl, make a whole and add the first listed ingredients (butter, salt, sugar, yellow of the egg and water). Since this is a short pastry, everything should be kneaded with the hands pretty fast. Wrap the dough in a cooking foil and leave the dough in the fridge for about an hour.
In the meantime, you can prepare the filling. Mix the quark, oil, sugar yellow of the egg and starch. Beat the egg whites until stiff and gently fold in the quark mass. Roll the dough and line the greased dish with the pastry. Now you can pour the quark mass and add the apricots on top. Put the baking tin in the oven on the second shelf from the bottom and bake for about 50-60 minutes. The oven may be opened only at the very end during the last 10 minutes, otherwise the cake will shrink. When the cake is done, slightly open the oven and leave to cool.
Finally, I heated apricot jam and covered the apricots to give them a nice gloss. – And voilà, your homemade apricot cheesecake is done. The cake tastes best if it is firm to the bite, therefore I would recommend to let it cool and leave it in the fridge for some time before you take the first bite.
Bon Appétit !