Plain Cheese Cake Basic recipe Made with Greek Yogurt in Instant Pot : with variation of Mango Cheese Cake and Strawaberries embedded in crust of Plain Cheese Cake.

As mentioned in previous recipe for Pistachio Cheese cake, I am going to post the recipe  for plain cheese cake, using plain sugar instead of condensed milk.   You can use the same recipe to make variety of flavors, like I did three different times. Once I made the plain NY style cheese cake, then Mango cheese cake and yesterday I made lime cheese cake withe strawberries embedded in crust of plain cheese cake.  You can go wild with your imagination with filling and topping.  If you don't want to use the Greek yogurt you can simply use 2 packs of 8 oz cream cheese instead of one pack  and 3/4 cups of sour cream instead of 1/2 cup.
 

First I am going to post ingredients and  basic method to bake the plain cheese cake and then will post additional ingredients of specific cakes with variations. You will need following gadgets.

• Instant pot (6 quart) and 2 cups of water
  
• 7" spring form pan for instant pot 
• Trivet to go under the pan
• Silicon sling like I used before or you can make a sling with aluminum foil
• Parchment paper
• Cooking oil spray 
• Aluminum foil to cover bottom and top of pan
  

Ingredients for Graham Cracker Crust:

• 9 -10 graham cracker sheet (one pack from the box) (makes about 1 and 1/2 cup of  crumbs when ground) 
• 4 tablespoon of melted butter
• 1/4 teaspoon of salt
• 1 tablespoon of brown sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla
  

Ingredients for  Plain Cheese filling: 

• One 8 oz pack of cream cheese
• 16 oz of Chobani whole milk plain Greek yogurt
• 1/2 cup of sour cream
• 2 eggs at room temp
  
• 2/3 cups  + 2 tablespoon of granulated sugar  (this will need to be adjusted when making Mango cheese cake from pulp)  (also you can use one cane of condensed milk if not using sugar but again for mango cheese cake the amount of condensed milk will be cut down to 1/2)
  
• 2 tablespoon of corn starch 
• 1/4  teaspoon of Kosher salt
  
• 2 teaspoon of vanilla 
• Juice and zest from 1/2 lime (optional you can omit these if you are making   NY style plain cheese cake)
  

Method to make crust: 

•  Preheat the oven at 350 F.
•  Wrap parchment paper on the base of spring form pan then attach it to the  the pan securing with lock.
•  Lightly spray the 7" spring form pan and the parchment paper with baking vegetable oil spray and wrap the outside of pan with aluminum foil.

•  In food processor coarsely grind the graham crackers to fine consistency and mix with melted butter, salt, brown sugar and vanilla, it will be like wet sand consistency.
  
• Press into the bottom and up to side of spring form pan, press it  firmly with flat bottom of a  measuring cup (I have wooden press that I used).
•  Place it in oven and bake it uncovered for 8 min.
• Take it out of oven then place the pan in freezer to cool while you prepare the filling.
  

• If you are making the cheese cake with strawberries slices embedded in the side of the crust, you can do it in this manner.
• Slice the strawberries  into thin lengthwise slices.
  
• When the baked  crust is cooled off, you can lay the strawberries slices around the edge of pan and just above the edge of crust in this manner like shown in picture.
• Set aside.
  
• The pan is now ready to be filled with filling.
  

Method to make the filling:  

• In the food processor blend sugar and eggs.
• Add cream cheese, yogurt, sour cream, corn starch, and  salt, blend.
• Add vanilla extract and mix well. 
• Add lime juice and zest last if you are adding these, then just mix with spatula.
  

 

• Pour the filling in  baked and cooled prepared  crust. 
• Remove the old aluminum foil from bottom of pan and place a new one and also cover the top of the  the pan with aluminum foil.
• Pour 2 cups of water in to instant pot pan.
• Place the trivet rack.
• Place the spring form pan in to sling.

• Carefully lower the sling with cheesecake spring form on to the trivet.
• Close the instant pot lid, select manual pressure cook and make sure it is on high pressure. 
• Set the timer for 45 min and seal vent.
• When it beeps you either turn it off or  switch to keep warm.
• Allow the pressure to release naturally (do not turn the pressure release to venting) It takes about 20 min for all the pressure to release. 

• When you see the pressure valve go down, remove the lid carefully, remove the sling with spring  form pan.
•  Remove the foil from top and bottom. 
•  If you see some water on top of cheese cake you can gently use a paper towel to soak the water

• Now you can place the pan in the fridge to cool uncovered for 2 hours.
• Then cover with plastic wrap and chill for over night for best result.

• Next day, take the spring form pan with cake out of the fridge and have the serving tray or cake stand ready next to the spring form cake pan.
• Unlock the spring form cake pan, carefully place the cake with on the serving tray or cake stand.
• Take a spatula and gently place between the crust and parchment paper and gently the slide the parchment paper and  bottom of the pan from under the cake, since you sprayed the parchment paper with vegetable oil spray, it should slide out clean.
• Now you can place the cake stand or serving tray with cake on it back in the fridge until ready to serve.

• Now for the variation of Mango Cheese cake, the crust and all the ingredients are same except you will need 10 oz of sweetened mango pulp. ( I used 1/2 can of 20 oz Mango pulp from Indian grocery store)
  
• Since the mango pulp is sweet you will need to cut down the granulated sugar to only 2 table spoon.
• You can omit the lime rind and lime juice for mango cheese cake, but if you like you can put some very small cubes if o fresh ripe  mango in the batter. however I did not.
  

You can top the plain cheese cake with fresh diced strawberries of you can make the fresh straweberry topping as follows:  

You will need following: 

• 1lb strawberries sliced (not very thin)
  
• 2 tablespoon of powdered sugar
• 1 tablespoon of corn starch 
• 3 tablespoon warm water
  
• Juice from one lemon ( however I used fresh tangerine juice as you can see in the picture as  I was out of lemon)
• 1 tables spoon of granulated sugar.
• 1 tablespoon of any strawberry or raspberry jam
  

 

Method: 

• Mix the powdered sugar, strawberries slices and  lemon juice. 
• Place this in the fridge 
• Whisk the corn starch and water together until dissolved.
• Place half of the strawberries  slices along with corn starch mixture and granulated sugar in a sauce pan and  heat it on medium low heat, simmer for 3-4 min.    
• Remove from heat and a  mix rest of the strawberries a     preserve and mix well and cool.   
• Place it back in the fridge and top the cake slice with this topping when ready to serve.
  

• Top the slice of plain cheese cake with fresh strawberry topping.
  
• You can top the fresh mango slices on mango cheese cake.
• All cheese cakes can be served without any toppings.                 

 

Enjoy !! 

    Recipes and Photographs by 

    Surekha.

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