Black Forest Cake is my all time favorite cake.
And cheesecake is my all time favorite dessert.
It only seems natural to take the best of both and turn it into a Vegan Black Forest Cheesecake!
My only regret is that I did not make this cheesecake sooner!
If you know anything at all about Gretchen’s Vegan Bakery you would know that my vegan cheesecake recipes are the best around.
You will not find an easier or better recipe anywhere I promise you that!
Unfortunately I recently ran into a bit of a conundrum when I moved from New Jersey to Florida.
Tofutti Brand vegan cream cheese is basically non existent!
This is a big deal you see, because I only use Tofutti brand cream cheese for all my baking projects! *Not sponsored!
It just happens to be the best vegan cream cheese for baking!
Believe me I have tried other brands with horrible results for baking.
I specify for baking though because while all of those other brands work beautifully for cold applications like No Bake Cheesecakes or Cream Cheese Icings and such, I have had terrible results with baking anything other than Tofutti Brand..
Ok so enough talking about my Florida vegan cream cheese whoa’s, let’s get back to the recipe!
With one simple ingredient added to my very versatile base recipe for cheesecake, (yes you must have guessed it was cherries!)
Oregon Canned Cherries is the star of this show today but if you cannot get them any canned pie & pastry filling would also work.
Or use fresh or frozen cherries! Like duh! Who knew that was a thing! LOL
If you do use frozen be sure to thaw them really well and drain them to avoid excess liquids in this recipe.
My cheesecake recipes are so versatile that you can really play around with ingredients here.
You can transform it into the most luxurious Black Forest Cheesecake ever!
The most recent recipe for Black Forest Brownies is the perfect base for this cheesecake too!
A small recipe of buttercream for giant pink pillows of icing to nestle those cherries into makes this cake so dreamy!
I had wished to get some fresh cherries for the garnish, which would have been way prettier.
However I could not get a fresh cherry to save my life this week!
No worries, if 2020 taught us anything it’s that we just have to adapt!
So a little bit of ganache poured into the center on top drives this whole cake home!
But if you did not want to go the extra steps as I did here with the ganache recipe and the buttercream, you will still have a beautiful, delicious cheesecake with out those things!
Since Black Forest is a combination of chocolate & cherry I would definitely add some shaved chocolate to the batter if you decide to forget the ganache topping.
You will notice in the video tutorial that I added Suncore Foods Pink Hibiscus Super Food Color Flower Powder to my buttercream for a stunning pink color.
Not to mention the taste of this flower powder was phenomenal!
Of course this is optional but I am seriously in love with their natural food color powders!
*not sponsored
CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE FULL YOUTUBE STEP BY STEP TUTORIAL FOR HOW TO MAKE THIS CHEESECAKE!
HERE ARE SOME MORE RECIPES FOR BLACK FOREST!
- Vegan Cream Cheese *I only use Tofutti Brand 16 ounces (454g) *see notes
- Vegan Granulated Sugar 1 cup (200g)
- Vegan Butter 2 tablespoons (28g)
- Cornstarch 3½ Tablespoons
- All Purpose Flour 2 Tablespoons
- Plant Milk 1 cup (237ml)
- Lactic Acid 2 teaspoons *see notes
- Salt pinch
- Vanilla Extract 2 teaspoons
- Canned or fresh or frozen cherries 1 cup *pitted
- ½ Recipe Black Forest Brownies baked into the same size pan as your cheesecake *I am using 7" cake pans
- ¼ Recipe Vegan Ganache *optional for topping
- Cherries for garnish *fresh would be great! But use drained canned if that's all you can get!
- Chocolate shavings for garnish *optional approximately 2 ounces shaved chocolate
- Optional Buttercream recipe for the rosette garnish- I used about ¼ recipe and added 1 teaspoon to the buttercream for intense color & flavor!
- Prepare your brownie base according to the instructions on that blog post, reserve until your cheesecake is cooled *typically takes 1 day for the cheesecake to be ready, so you can wrap and store the brownie base until then.
- Grease & parchment line a 7" cake pan and preheat the oven to 350°F
- Prepare the cheesecake batter by combining all the ingredients except the cherries into your food processor and whiz until smooth.
- Add the cherries and pulse to get them chopped inside the batter, you don't want to puree them to oblivion! *Alternatively you can just rough chop them by hand and add them to the batter!
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake at 350°F for 1 hour.
- After 1 hour turn the oven off and let the cheesecake stay inside to cool slowly for another hour.
- Remove cheesecake from oven and let cool to cold on the counter then refrigerate at least 4 hours or overnight before unmolding.
- Unmolding vegan cheesecakes seem to be so easy even if you are using a cake pan!
- Just submerge the pan into some hot water, run a spatula around the inside edge to loosen and then it will slip right out!
- Invert it onto a serving platter, adhere the brownie base with a light schmear of ganache for "glue" and then proceed to garnish as shown in the video tutorial or decorate as you like!
Vegan Lactic Acid is what really helps the authentic taste of my cheesecakes for that characteristic "tang". If you don't have it you can use 2 teaspoons of apple cider vinegar instead
STORAGE: Cheesecake must be kept refrigerated at all times, it will be ok at room temperature for up to 3 hours, but store refrigerated for up to 1 week loosely wrapped
3.5.3251
3.5.3251
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