Lemon Almond Cheesecake

March 10, 2015

It’s not that having 1/20th of a slice of Lemon Almond Cheesecake means that you’re eating one pound of cream cheese, 12 egg yolks and 3 cups of sour cream. In fact, 1/20th of a slice (a full half of my daily WW points–15 points, just saying) of this fluffy cheesecake tastes only of almonds and lemon. The texture is completely unsuspecting, and charming–authentically.

I brought this cake with me to a friend’s dinner (it weighed a ton) and we served it with Grappa. At the table sat a strapping 21 year old, his girlfriend and four adults. After eating a full meal, cheese course included, everyone (except me) had a second slice. No one complained about sore bellies. Only 1/4 of the cheesecake remained. I suspect that their son polished it off the next morning. OMG.

The Finer Cookie is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for websites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com. This post contains affiliate links, which means The Finer Cookie will receive a small commission if you make a purchase using this link. This modest income helps support the website.

Ingredients

Volume Grams Ounces

Instructions

MAKING THE BISCUIT CAKE BASE

This was fairly straight forward. I always love making biscuit.

Adding the cake flour to the toasted almonds.

Adding the meringue to the batter and folding it with a flat whisk

Pouring the batter into the prepared pan

It baked to 1/2″ thick.

The baked biscuit. It’s a little brown because I’m playing with my oven settings.

Per the instructions, the cake should compress to 1/4″ under the weight of the filling. I considered adding two layers of cake, and maybe I should have because it simple disappeared in the cheesecake. I couldn’t see it or taste it.

ALMOND LEMON FILLING FOR THE CHEESECAKE

Having lots of almond flour on hand, so I used it rather than the sliced almonds.

I assembled the filling, and everything looked good, and then the filling went liquid. It was no longer thick and spreadable. Maybe the sugar pulled the liquid out of the filling? I worried that the texture wouldn’t be correct. There wasn’t anything I could do about it.
I poured the filling into the prepared pan and didn’t need to “smooth” it, as the instructions say.

Pouring the batter into the 9″ springform pan. See how liquid the batter is.

BAKE THE CHEESECAKE

I used a fresh piece of heavy duty aluminum foil and wrapped it around the spring form pan and tied a string around it to keep the water out.
I VERY CAREFULLY added water to the pan and VERY CAREFULLY walked it to the oven. I felt confident that the foil was intact and I hadn’t gotten any water inside. I baked it as instructed, and after it had rested for an hour in a turned off oven. Then I went to dance Tango for the afternoon.
Incidentally, look at this mess. I must have had my entire battery of gear in use for this recipe and then some! I just couldn’t keep it together…

CHILL THE CHEESECAKE

I removed the aluminum foil from around the pan and water poured out. I have no idea if water got into the cake due to the water bath or if the cheesecake had watered out because I over beat the filling.
I laid a towel on the shelf of the refrigerator and set the cake on it overnight. The next morning, the towel was soaked, which tells me that maybe the cheesecake watered out.

MAKING THE LEMON CURD GLAZE

Making the lemon curd was very easy–for a change.

The butter, egg yolks and sugar whipped into a pommade (of sorts).

APPLYING THE LEMON CURD GLAZE

Rose was right, the glaze set quickly. It spread easily, but I could see the brown cheesecake underneath. I considered making another batch so that I could get the glassy glaze finish and it would then be opaque, but I ran out of energy and didn’t feel like it.

Just to absorb any condensation from the warm curd.

UNMOLDING THE CHEESECAKE

When I released the pan, and removed the cake from the plate, there was still a surprising amount of water resting on the plate, so much so that it had to be poured out. ????????? The cake was very heavy, and seemed wet. The cardboard cake round underneath was soaked. ?????????

CUTTING THE CHEESECAKE

It cut well enough and didn’t weep any further. I was the only one who knew that the cake watered out, so to my palate, it was a little wet, but to everyone else it was moist and creamy.

Almond Lemon Cheesecake, The Finer Cookie.

WHAT ARE THE ALPHA BAKERS? :

Here’s how it works: once a week, for the next two years, 25 Alpha Bakers commit to baking their way through every recipe of Rose Levy Beranbaum’s newly published The Baking Bible. Each week we post our experiences on our blog sites: our successes, our failures, our like and dislikes . The recipes are scheduled in advance so that everyone will be baking the same recipe at the same time. Unfortunately, no recipes can be shared in my Alpha Bakers posts due to publishing restrictions, but if you love to bake, The Baking Bible. is a must-have book. You can see other tutorials for the same recipe at the following link The Baking Bible Alpha Bakers at http://rosesalphabakers.blogspot.ca/. ;