Wednesday, June 15, 2016

Delicious Healthy Blue Cheese Cashew Cherry Cheesecake Recipe- Paleo, GAPS Legal, Egg Free


I love cheesecake, but, for the most part, it doesn't exactly love me. That is why I've made many versions of cashew based non dairy cheesecakes over the years. The thing is- sometimes I want a dairy dessert, but there aren't many dairy items I can eat without them bothering my stomach. The list is limited to blue cheese, camembert, kashkaval, brie, Parmesan and Swiss cheeses. I figured out a delicious recipe for a fruit tart with blue cheese, but I still wanted to figure out a cheesecake I could eat, despite not being able to eat the standard cheesecake ingredients.

Googling, I discovered that there is such a thing as blue cheese cheesecake, but since blue cheese is so strong, there is a minimal amount of blue cheese used and the bulk of the cheesecake is ingredients I can't eat- cream cheese, eggs, and sugar. However, that did give me the idea to use my standard cheesecake base- cashews- and use blue cheese as the flavor addition, so I experimented with this idea, taking a gamble, and yowza- it paid off big time! This blue cheese cashew cheesecake was so delicious that I will certainly be making it again and again, for special occasions anyhow.
To make it extra special I decided to top it with some pure cherry puree that I'd made and had in my freezer, but it can be left off or replaced with any other thick fruit puree or pie filling.

This recipe is paleo (for those that allow certain aged cheeses on the paleo diet) and by using honey instead of jaggery syrup, is GAPS legal as well.
In terms of health- well, its certainly healthier than your run of the mill cheesecake, not super high in carbs, and no unhealthy processed ingredients. But it is very high in fat so you don't want to be eating too much of this in one go. I made this in a muffin tin with six compartments, but in the future, I think I'll make this in mini muffin tins so that there will be more servings.
As for cost? I added up how much this cost me to make, and it works out to be less than $5 for the batch so really not bad at all!

This has to be kept in the freezer up until you eat it, but the texture is so perfect that it has the right consistency just out of the freezer, and doesn't need to soften up first at all.

I highly recommend this cheesecake recipe, if you like blue cheese. My husband compared this cheesecake and a standard cheesecake side by side and said this one was tastier by far, so that's just really cool.

Delicious Healthy Blue Cheese Cashew Cherry Cheesecake Recipe- Paleo, GAPS Legal, Egg Free

Ingredients:
1 cups cashews
1/3 cup coconut oil
1/3 cup jaggery syrup or honey or maple syrup to taste (start with 1/4 cup then work your way up if needed)
4-6 tablespoons blue cheese
2 tablespoons lemon juice
Cherry puree or other pie filling (optional)

Instructions:
1. Soak cashews in water 4-12 hours or until completely soft.

2. Pour off the water and puree the soaked cashews in a food processor, scraping down the sides regularly, until it is fully smooth, with no hard pieces left.

3. Add coconut oil and sweetener, then puree some more.

4. Crumble the blue cheese and blend them and the lemon juice together with the cashew puree until fully blended up and incorporated. Add 4 tablespoons of blue cheese to start off with, and if you still want it stronger, add the other two tablespoons. But be warned, with 6 tablespoons it does have a stronger blue cheese taste.

5. Pour into silicon muffin molds.

6. If desired, top with fruit puree.

7. Freeze 4-5 hours or until completely solidified.

Enjoy!

Are you a fan of blue cheese? How about cheesecake? Do you have any other suggestions how to make a cheesecake or other dessert using the cheeses I can eat? 
Ever heard of blue cheese cheesecake before, whether with cream cheese or cashews?
Does this look like a recipe you'd try?

1 comment:

  1. i dont have blue cheese near me-- what other cheese would you try with the rest of the recipe being the same?

    ReplyDelete

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