No-Bake Passion Fruit Chili Cheesecake #Recipe by @LibbyKlein

 

Libby Klein I'm obsessed with using chili and fruit in cheesecake. Probably because I can't tolerate spicy food, so those chilis would never work for me under normal circumstances. But once combined with the cream cheese, the heat mellows and lovely fruit notes are revealed. The passion fruit gel on top gives a delightful zing that pairs nicely with the cheesecake and balances the sweetness.

I wouldn’t normally make a no bake cheesecake since I prefer the traditional baked dessert, but I wanted to give you the recipe Poppy used during the Restaurant Weeks are Murder competition. It was a Chopped-style mystery basket competition for local Cape May chefs to win their restaurant on the cover of the South Jersey Dining Guide. This no bake version uses gelatin instead of eggs. Mini spring form pans enable the cheesecake to set up quickly. You could make one big 8 or 9-inch cheesecake if you’d rather. You would just need to let it chill for several hours to be firm enough to cut.

Use rubber or latex kitchen gloves when cutting chili peppers – remove gloves and don’t touch anything the gloves have touched when you’re finished.

No-Bake Passion Fruit Chili Cheesecake

Ingredients

Cheesecake Filling

1 envelope Knox plain gelatin

3 Tablespoons cold water

¾ cup frozen passion fruit pulp, thawed (you could also use fresh passion fruits, pulped, and strained.)

*1-2 chili peppers

1 can dulce de leche (or sweetened condensed milk - about 1 ¼ cups)

16 oz cream cheese, softened

Almond meal – a few tablespoons to dust the bottom of the spring form pans. You could also make yourself a crust if you want, but Poppy just made the cheesecake without a cookie bottom.

Rubber kitchen gloves

*I used red serrano chilis for a gentle heat. If you want more of a bite you can use habaneros.

 

Passion Fruit Jelly for the top:

1 envelope Knox plain gelatin

3 Tablespoons cold water

4 oz passion fruit juice

¼ cup sugar

Instructions

1. Put on your rubber gloves. Seed and chop your chilis. Don’t touch anything. Don’t rub your eye or scratch your face. When your chilis are chopped very small, add them to your passion fruit juice. Clean up the area and equipment you used and throw away your gloves.

2. Mix the gelatin with the water and let it bloom. Then, microwave the gelatin for 20 -30 seconds so it melts. Add it to the passion fruit juice and peppers.

3. In a mixing bowl, whip your softened cream cheese until it’s smooth. Doing this now will help the finished batter not be lumpy. When the cheese is fluffy and smooth, add the dulce de leche (or sweetened condensed milk.) At the lowest speed, beat for 1 to 1.5 minutes until the mixture is well-blended. Add in the passion fruit juice, fold or beat at the lowest speed until the mixture is incorporated.

4. Sprinkle the bottom of your spring form pan/s with almond meal. Enough to cover the bottom and make releasing the cheesecake easier.

5. Pour the cream cheese mixture on top. Smooth out the surface because what it looks like now is what it’s going to look like later. It isn’t going to move. Refrigerate until set. 3o minutes for minis. Several hours for a large cheesecake.

B. Passion Fruit Jelly for the top:

1. Mix the gelatin with the water and let it bloom. Then, microwave the gelatin for 20 -30 seconds so it melts. Add in 1/4 cup of sugar and microwave another 40-60 seconds to melt. Keep your eye on it so it doesn’t boil over. Using oven mits or a towel, remove bowl from microwave. Add the 4oz passion fruit juice that you thawed and set aside.

2. When this mixture is nice a cool, it doesn’t have to be cold - but it can’t be warm- and the cheesecake is cold, gently pour the passion fruit liquid on top of the cheesecakes. Chill for another 2 – 4 hours.

3. When you’re ready to serve, use a butter knife to gently go around the inside of the spring form pan to help release the cheesecake from the liner. The cheesecake should come off the bottom easily because of the almond meal.

Gluten-free baker Poppy McAllister and her aunt Ginny are looking forward to a quiet, homey Christmas at their B&B in Cape May, but unfortunately, death isn’t taking a holiday this year . . .

Ever since Thanksgiving, Poppy and her pals have been left with an unsolved mystery of the romantic kind. But at least this mystery isn’t the kind that involves murder. That all changes when the body of a fish supplier is discovered in the kitchen of her ex’s restaurant—and he’s frozen, not fresh.

For once, it’s not Poppy who tripped over the corpse, yet she can’t escape being drawn in since the victim has a note taped to him reading Get Poppy. Figures—an engagement ring isn't labeled, but the dead guy is addressed to her. Now, while Aunt Ginny plans a tree-trimming party and pressures Poppy to decode a mysterious old diary, the amateur sleuth is asked to “unofficially” go undercover at the restaurant to help the police. Until then, the only crime Poppy had been dealing with was Figaro’s repeated thefts of bird ornaments from the tree; now it looks like it’s going to be a murder-y Christmas after all.

 

Libby Klein grew up in Cape May, NJ where she attended high school in the '80s. Her 
classes revolved mostly around the Culinary sciences and Drama, with one brilliant semester in Poly-Sci that may have been an accident. She loves to drink coffee, bake gluten-free goodies, collect fluffy cats, and translate sarcasm for people who are too serious. She writes from her Northern Virginia office where she serves a very naughty black smoke Persian named Sir Figaro Newton. You can keep up with her shenanigans by signing up for her Mischief and Mayhem Newsletter on her website. www.LibbyKleinBooks.com/Newsletter/