No. 224Recipe Card Posted on 4 Comments

Skinny Mocha Cheesecakes

Bijouxs_mochacheesecaks-web

Skinny and not-too-sweet little cheesecake gems, with a hint of coffee and chunks of dark rich chocolate–the recipe gets light with homemade yogurt cheese. Let’s have dessert.

I worked as a personal chef for many years with the majority of my daily cooking centered around clients’ dietary needs–this recipe however, is fashioned to suit one special client–me. Here’s the skinny.

As friends know, I am, well…discriminating in my food preferences. As far as cooks go, I generally prefer very simple, fresh foods, along with the chowing down of an occasional chili dog. I enjoy the flavor of cheesecake, but find it as a dessert overall to be far-too-rich and far-too-sweet–so I fashioned a riff for when I want to splurge. I had hoped to include this recipe in my first cookbook Family & Friends (shameless plug) but ran out of room (digitally speaking, file size).

Cheesecake is traditionally comprised of a short list of ingredients. For the skinny, I reduced the graham cracker crust to just-a-dusting, then subbed non-fat yogurt cheese (which is easy to make) for cream cheese, reduced the sugar, and baked the little gems in individual serving tart pans. The result yields a lighter and thinner cheesecake profile. One ingredient I did not cut back is tasting chocolate bars for the topping, they make these lighter cheesecakes sing.

Make your own yogurt cheese the night before by simply placing 3 small cartons of plain non-fat yogurt (avoid Greek-style) in a handy yogurt cheese maker or in a fine wire mesh strainer lined with a double layer of cheesecloth, placed over a large bowl. Cover and allow the yogurt to drain overnight. Almost all of the liquids will be removed and the next day you will have a thick, creamy non-fat yogurt cheese to use in the cheesecake.

Refrigerate the baked cheesecakes for a minimum of a few hours or better yet overnight. I like to serve them sporting a dusting of cocoa powder, and who knows for guests, perhaps even something as reckless as a dollop of whipped cream.

As always, enjoy. B

4 thoughts on “Skinny Mocha Cheesecakes

  1. Sometimes I make yogurt cheese on accident. If you leave an opened, half eaten container (covered) in the fridge too long it separates! Maybe I should stop tossing them. GREG

    1. Ok Greg, so no more throwing it out–add some garlic and herbs–voilà-a garlicky cheese spread for crackers or to tuck inside an omelette. Enjoy!

  2. I just saw a tip that I never would have thought of. If you don’t have individual tart pans, you can use wide mouth canning lids. It won’t be as pretty, of course, but still…

    I’ll have to try this recipe out. Thanks!

    1. Hi Lynn (wow, another Lynn:) What a great idea! I just measured the wide mouth canning lids I have, they are a little smaller than the four-inch the tart pans, so you may get more than six cheesecakes out of the batch using the lids – but brilliant! Thank you so much for sharing this with all of us!

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