Final baking challenge - Maple goat cheese cake

I’m happy that I can tell you that Ytha (my no-sugar, no-wheat and no-other-stuff friend) liked all my baking! She tasted the maple syrup cakes, maple syrup goat cheesecake (recipe will follow), pistachio maple syrup cookies (the cookies formerly known as walnut-honey cookies) and dried fruit muffins.
The maple syrup goat cheesecake was the only recipe I didn’t test before she came but it turned out great. I had to search for a good piecrust recipe to use instead of the crust they used in this maple cheese yoghurt cake recipe. I searched the Internet for a crust recipe with maple syrup as a sweetener but not a lot of (good) recipes came up. Didn’t feel like fooling around with a regular piecrust recipe myself. In the end I found this almond piecrust recipe with maple syrup. I used pecan nuts instead of almonds because Ytha (also) doesn’t eat almonds. It’s a very easy crust that you just press into the pie pan. To make the filling suitable for Yhta I used goat cheese and yoghurt instead of regular. The original recipe is quite a big one, I used ¾ and it was stil too much. The recipe below is half of the original and probably even this will be (a little) too much. I poured the leftover filling in some ramekins, baked it without crust and served it with maple syrup.
The pecan nut crust really complements the maple and goat cheese of the filling. It reminded me somewhat of Bastogne cookies...probably the cinnamon that was inside. You might think that the crust would be very heavy given the fat that it contains but it doesn’t come across as being very fat. The filling didn’t taste very sweet so I served the cake with maple syrup (grade B) on the side for some extra sweetness. Not only Ytha enjoyed this cake...Christie (my friend that eats everything...or more correct: that can eat everything), Adriaan and myself enjoyed it a lot too!



serves 8

Crust
200 g (2 ¼ cup) finely ground pecans
½ ts cinnamon
½ ts ginger powder
75 g (⅓ cup) butter, melted
2 tbs maple syrup

Mix the pecans with the cinnamon and the ginger. Add butter and maple syrup and stir until blended. Press into a 9-inch pie plate. Chill for at least 15 minutes.

Notes
- if you use this crust with a different filling that needs to be baked, don’t bake it higher then 165-175ºC (325-350ºF)
- if you use this crust with a filling that doesn’t need baking, pre-bake the crust at 175ºC (350ºF) for 15-20 minutes.

Filling
2 eggs
340 g (12 oz) goat cream cheese (the fattest I could find had 17% fat)
60 ml (¼ cup) maple syrup
120 ml (½ cup) goat yoghurt
½ vanilla bean

Preheat the oven at 165ºC (325ºC). Beat the eggs until creamy. Cream the cream cheese in a different bowl. Add the maple syrup and blend well. Add eggs, yoghurt, the inside of the vanilla bean and stir until thoroughly combined. Pour into pie crust. Bake for 50 minutes. Allow to cool on a wire rack. Refrigerate for at least 3 hours before serving (if you don’t the crust won’t hold its shape).

1 serving – 400 kcal
100 g – 335 kcal

carbohydrate 11 g – protein 10 g – fat 28 g (saturated fat 9 g) – fibre 2 g