Vegan mango and ginger cheesecake
Vegan mango and ginger cheesecake
I’ve been reminiscing about how obscenely sweet and juicy the mangoes were when I spent a month with Duncan travelling around Australia. I was reconciled with the fact that my mango recipe ideas will have to wait until we move (not that fast, Ania!), okay, visit Australia or perhaps South-East Asia again.
I mean, Greece has such an abundance of beautiful summer fruit that I wasn’t even that bummed, but I do happen to love mangoes so I was missing their flavour a fair bit.
That was until I walked into our green grocers one day and saw a two trays of mangoes. One contained large, still very green specimens clearly imported from Brasil, which I was not that excited about as I found them to be lacking in the flavour department. The other mangoes couldn’t look more different – they were very small, oddly shaped yet they appeared beautifully ripe and fragrant. The owner must have seen the cogs in my brain turning so he hastened to inform me that the smaller ones are grown on Paros. WHAT? OMG! ‘Are you sure?’ I said to him.
Contrary to what you may think, Greek islands are not great for growing stuff in summer as there is no rain for months. Of course, he was sure! We decided to buy a few to jazz up our morning Bircher muesli. Despite their small stature, these little guys punched SO MUCH flavour that I immediately felt so much more awake (I’m not a morning person) as soon as I had my first spoonful. From that point onward, I started fantasising about turning them into a summery vegan mango and ginger cheesecake… So here it is!
CHEESECAKE BASE
- ¾ cup / 125 g dates, pitted and soaked in boiling water
- about ¾ cup / 100 g almonds
- about ½ cup / 50 g desiccated coconut
- a few pinches of salt (optional)
CHEESECAKE LAYER
- 1¼ cup / 185 g raw cashews (soaked overnight)
- ½ cup coconut cream
- 4½ level tsp agar agar flakes*
- 5 tbsp lime or lemon juice
- 5 tbsp maple syrup
- 4 tsp finely grated ginger
- ½ cup aquafaba** OR water
MANGO LAYER
- 2 cups / 400 g cubed mango
- 2 level tsp agar agar flakes*
- Line the bottom of your spring form tin (mine was 16 cm / 6 ” across and 6.5 cm / 2.5 ” tall) with a circle of baking paper and cut out a long rectangle to line the sides with.
CHEESECAKE BASE
- Grind your almonds in a food processor until you get a coarse crumb. Take them out of the food processor and set aside.
- Drain your dates, squeeze excess water out and chop them roughly. Place them into the food processor (no need to wash it after you process the almonds) and process into a smooth paste.
- In a bowl, mix date paste with enough ground almonds and desiccated coconut to obtain a dough that isn’t too sticky yet still holds together well. I prefer doing it by hand but you could also just dump your ground almonds and desiccated coconut back into the food processor and incorporate all of them together. Season with a bit of salt to taste.
- Line the sides of the spring form tin and then mould the base mixture to the bottom of your tin. Press the mixture down well with your fingers so that there are no gaps / air-bubbles. Put a bit of baking paper on top of the base and weigh it down with something heavy (I used a round container of similar size, filled with sugar). Put into the fridge while you make your cheesecake mixture.
CHEESECAKE LAYER
- Just before you are ready to start blending the cheesecake layer, put agar flakes and ½ cup of aquafaba (or water if you don’t want to use aquafaba) into a small pot. Let the mixture come to the boil and simmer on low-medium heat, stirring frequently, until flakes almost dissolve and the mixture thickens (about 10 mins). From that point onward, you’ll need to work fast as agar sets as soon as it cools down.
- Chuck rinsed cashews, coconut cream, maple syrup, grated ginger, lime juice, warm agar mixture and an extra ¼ cup / 60 ml of water into a blender. Blend, scraping the sides of the blender from time to time as the set agar likes to stay on those. You’ll need to work fast as agar sets as soon as it cools down.
- As soon as the cheesecake mixture is super smooth, take the spring form tin out of the fridge and pour the cheesecake mixture on top of the set base. Make sure you do it very quickly to get a smooth finish as, like I mentioned before, agar sets very quickly. Gently hit the filled spring form tin against your work surface a few times to get rid of air pockets / bubbles. Allow this layer to set completely (about 10 mins) before pouring on the next layer.
MANGO LAYER
- Put cubed mango pieces into a clean blender and blend until smooth.
- Put ¼ cup / 60 ml of water into a small pot and add agar agar flakes. Let the mixture come to the boil and simmer on low-medium heat, stirring frequently, until flakes almost dissolve and the mixture thickens (about 10 mins).
- Add agar mixture to the mango puree and blend until smooth. Pour over the cheesecake layer and allow it to set before decorating.
**Aquafaba – water from a can of low-sodium chickpeas or from cooking dry chickpeas at home. I did not reduce aquafaba for this application.
No, there is no need although it does speed things up a little - agar agar sets at the temperature below 40º C (104º F). Please do make sure you activate it first as per the instructions on the packet as powder and flakes need different activation method/time. Hope that helps! Ania
I just made this wonderful recipe,I wanted to know if I could freeze it after it sets in the fridge?
Many thanks,
Karen
I adapted the raw nut butter method. Using the nut mill that came with my stick blender I grind together the nuts and pre-ground linseed. However I stop just before it turns into a nut butter when it starts to come together but it's not smooth. At this stage is some of the nuts have become butter but some of them are still very fine crumbs. This mixture holds together very well by itself without any additions, and is yummy and healthy. You can just press it into the bottom of your cake tin and use as normal.
Yes, it should work, but it is likely to contain some acid (as a preservative) so you may need to increase the amount of agar agar a little as, like gelatine, it is weakened by acid. Hope that helps! Ania
This looks delicious. I was wondering if there is a substitute for agar agar or if there is anything else I could use instead?
No, there isn't anything I'm aware of, I'm afraid. You could skip agar and use fat (coconut oil) to set it, but I don't know how much exactly you would need. At least 1/4 cup, I imagine! Ania
Yes, I mean the fatty part that rises to the top of a full fat coconut milk can or you can also buy just coconut cream on its own in a can, but creamed coconut is a different thing, as far as I know. Hope that helps! Ania
Thanks! x
I have not tried that myself, but I don't see why it wouldn't work. Good luck! Ania
i have a question.......how it goes with the sides of the cake? i mean how it is puckered?
tnx in advance
Thanks! I wrapped a piece of baking paper inside the tin to make sure there is no discolouration and when I took it off, it left that pattern. Hope that helps. Ania
Have a lovely weekend.
Cindy
I don't wanna confuse you, but 2 tbsp (I assume that's what you mean by 2T?) of agar powder sounds like an awful lot as it is much stronger than agar flakes. Bear in mind that the cheesecake mixture is not a thin liquid, it contains a fair amount of fat which means that you'll need less setting agent to set it than if your were making a jelly, for example. I would use 2 tsp max - maybe that's what you mean, but I just don't want you to have a rock hard cheesecake so thought I would let you know ;) . Have a lovely weekend too and hope the cheesecake comes out just right! Ania
I absolutely love this vegan mango and ginger cheesecake recipe here.
I would also love to feature it in our website Greenthickies. Would it be all right if I used one image for it? I will not be posting the actual recipe but only one image, title, a small quote and then link directly back here.
Would that be okay?
Thanks a Lot:)
I'm chuffed to hear that you like my recipe so much. And no problem, what you describe above is fine by us. Cheers, Ania
Thank you!
I'm not sure as I haven't tried making this without cashews so you'll need to experiment a bit first. The advantage of using cashews over other nuts / nut butters is that they have a very subtle taste, which allows other flavour (ginger in this case) to come through. Not sure which nut butter you are thinking of but you'll need to use a lot of it to compensate for that amount of cashews. It may work though, worth trying on a small sample! Good luck! Ania
Thank you for sharing this recipe.
I've made this cheesecake today and it was amazing!
My mom and I love it .
Love from Holland!
That's so lovely to hear that both you and your mum loved it :) Yay! Ania
I'm happy you are planning to make my cheesecake and no, I don't see any issues with doubling the quantities. Hope your friends will like it! Ania
This looks amazing! I just found it and want to do it immediately tonight! What would you recommend if I want to make it immediately and do not have raw cashews (soaked overnight)?
Thanks!
You could soak cashews in boiling water for about 1-2 hrs instead - they should be sufficiently soft after that time. I haven't tried making this cheesecake with anything else so I cannot recommend a replacement that I am sure will work, I'm afraid. Hope that helps!
Ania
I'm making this today for Christmas :)
Thanks!
Raw almonds will do the trick just fine! Good luck!
I have not prepared food with Agar Agar before. It gave me a challenge. I only have a 20cm pan, so the base mix just covered the bottom luckily. I put it in the freezer in between layers for quicker cooling and setting.
The centre was delicious and set well. The top didn't really set, but was amazingly delicious anyway.
It took me quite a while to prepare this recipe (about an hour) as I hadn't used Agar Agar before and found it a bit fiddly. Other than that I found it was fairly straight forward.
Thank you . I tagged you in my Instagram pic.
I'm sharnaskindkitchen.
:)
My pleasure, I'm glad you liked it and it worked out well in the end :) I find that when using any ingredient for the first time there is always a bit of a learning curve. When you say that your mango layer didn't set - how much mango puree did you use, what type of agar (flakes or powder) and how much agar? (I'm assuming to activated agar prior to use.) Ania
PS: didn't have any notification from Insta from you :( can you try again please? x
Thank you so much for another amazing recipe!!! I made this yesterday and the taste is delicious!! BUT, although it is the first time I use agar agar, I don't think the flakes / powder amount is correct. I'm not sure though... I'm an agar agar beginner!! I used the powder, exactly as you said, but the cake didn't become solid enough in the fridge, so I had to put it in the freezer for a couple of hours, but it became more of an ice-cake... still delicious though, but I was really hoping to get the "yelly" cheesecake result. Perhaps I did something wrong? Next time I'll use the flakes!!
Much love from the Netherlands,
Lucia Flores
Thanks for your message. I'm so pleased to hear that you liked the taste, such a shame it didn't set. I am confident about the amount of agar flakes being correct as that's what I used multiple times and the cheesecakes set at room temperature within minutes. As for the powder, like I said in the notes, the conversion is what I found on the Internet and I haven't been able to test it myself as I cannot get agar powder where I live. In fact, I took a more conservation conversation into account (3 tsp agar flakes = 1 tsp agar powder) as some sources say that 3 tsp agar flakes equals 1/2 tsp agar powder. It may also depend on the brand of agar powder used so I guess it is best to test with the particular brand you can buy. I use flakes by this brand in case you are able to get them. Good luck with the next attempt and I hope it will set beautifully for you!
x
Ania
Have a great weekend!
XOXO,
Lucia