This year’s christmas called for some new cake ideas. Where last year’s cake was a somewhat asianized version of a traditional German cake — Singapore Kranz, this year called for an all-time favorite.
Since I know that the host David likes cheesecake, I decided for mini cheesecakes. They are cupcake sized and have some fruity touch. The pomegranates are not only a nice topping but also served as a fruit layer between the delicious filling and the dough housing.
Easy to make and will definitely refresh after a delicious christmas dinner.

Recipe

Have all ingredients ready and pre-heat the oven to about 180°C. In addition to the ingredients, a muffin/cupcake mould is required. Measurements are made for about 12 cheesecakes. The entire preparation takes around 35-45 minutes, depending on your skill of peeling out the pomegranate kernels.

Ingredients

All the measurements are related to German cooking recipes but should be understandable everywhere; all in all a little bit more or less doesn’t hurt. The pudding is normal milk based pudding powder like this or this.

The dough

• 150g butter or margarine
• 250g flour
• 150g sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 table spoon baking powder
• 2 spoons of Milk

• 1 prince of salt

  The cream filling

• 500g of cottage cheese
• 100g of cream cheese
• 1 package of pudding
• 1 package of vanilla powder
• 1 egg
• 150g sugar
• 2 small drinking cups of milk
• 1/2 small drinking cup of oil
• 1 pomegranate

Preparation

1. Mix all the dry ingredients and then add then add the wet ones for the dough. Do this until you have a nice and smooth dough that can easily be formed.
2. Grease the moulds with oil or butter to make removal after baking easier.
3. Fill the dough into the muffin moulds. Also cover the sides of the mould with dough. (see cover picture)
4. Extract the pomegranate kernels from the fruit and wash them thoroughly. Tipp: Hit the whole fruit with a meat tenderiser before cutting it open.
5. Place a hand full of kernels in the dough-covered moulds. (see picture 1)
6. Mix the ingredients for the cream and beat them with an electric hand-mixer until you have a homogeneous creamy consistency.
7. If you have some kernels left, they can always be used for decoration.
8. Fill the dough-covered moulds with cream. Try not to fill them up too much over the covered sides.(see picture 1, bottom left)
9. Put the mould in the oven. The second level should fine and leave it there for 35 minutes. (say: Hey siri, set timer for 35 minutes. And see what happens)
10. Please check regularly to avoid burning. They are done when the top has a light brown color. (compare pictures 2 and 3)
11. Take them out and let them cool down. If necessary place them into the fridge until they are eaten.

Pictures

Post production

This is optional but nice to have.

• Use the rest of the pomegranates, cut them and heat them up in a pot with 3 spoons of sugar and a splash of red wine.
• Arrange each cheesecake on a single platter and serve some of the pomegranate reduction with it.
• Placing a small piece of chocolate with it can hurt either. Everything is better with chocolate, right?

The final result

I served some blueberry reduction with it, since I had used most of the pomegranates for a different meal and I had them lying around.

I wish everyone happy baking. Please let me know if you think something might not be all right or what kind of alterations to the recipe are even better. Leave a comment.