No-Bake Tropical Cheesecake
No-bake cheesecakes are perfect during hot summer days! First because you don’t need to use your oven which is turning your place hotter than it already is. Second because their texture is lighter than traditional oven-baked cheesecakes! This tropical cheesecake is even refreshing as it is sprinkled with lime zests and served with a passion fruit sauce.
The crust is composed of speculoos cookies, brown salted butter and sugar. I used speculoos cookies because I love their spicy taste and crunchy texture. You can use graham crackers or any other type of cookies you like. You can also switch salted butter to unsalted butter and not even make a brown butter if it’s too much of a bother for you!
Since there is white chocolate in this cheesecake, you want the cream cheese to be at room temperature before incorporating the melted chocolate so it doesn’t create lumps.
The piped whipped cream is a nice addition, giving the cheesecake height and style!
To make the cheesecake unmolding easier, I used an acetate cake strip on the inside of the ring. If you don’t have any, grease the inside edges of the ring and stick a strip of parchment paper onto it.
Passion fruit is my favorite fruit, I love its color, the crunchy seeds, the sour taste… It can be a little hard to find and therefore quite pricey. A good alternative would be to use mango, or do half passion fruit, half mango.
Passion fruits are ready to eat when they get wrinkly and soft to the touch. Simply cut them in half and scoop the pulp out with a spoon. I used their shells – rinsed and dried – to put the passion fruit sauce in, it creates a cool tropical decor.
You can keep this cheesecake for a couple of days in the fridge. It can also be frozen in an airtight container without impacting the taste or texture.
No-bake tropical cheesecake
Ingredients
Brown butter crust
- 1½ cup speculoos crumbs * 200 g or 26 Lotus speculoos cookies
- 2 tbsp sugar 30 g
- ⅓ cup salted butter 100 g
Filling
- ⅔ cup whipping cream 150 ml
- 1 ⅔ cup cream cheese 375 g – room temperature
- ⅔ cup white chocolate 105 g – melted
- ½ tbsp sugar 7.5 g
- 1 tsp vanilla extract 5 g
- ⅛ tsp agar agar 1 g
- ½ tbsp whipping cream 7.5 ml
- 1 tbsp water 15 ml
Whipped cream
- ¾ cup whipping cream 180 ml
- 1½ tbsp sugar 22 g
Passion fruit sauce
- 4 passion fruits
- 4 tsp sugar 20 g
- 5 tbsp orange juice 50 ml
- 3 tbsp cold water 50 ml
- ½ tsp cornstarch
Lime zests – organic
Instructions
Brown butter crust
- Make the brown butter. In a pot over medium heat, melt the butter. When it starts bubbling, whisk constantly until it reaches a nice amber color and smells nutty. Strain in a glass or metal container – don't use plastic as it's going to melt because of the high temperature of the butter.
- Place the ring on a tray lined with parchment paper. Place an acetate cake strip on the inside of the ring, if you don't have any, grease the ring and use parchment paper.
- In a bowl, mix together the speculoos crumbs, sugar and brown butter.
- Press into the bottom and on the edges of the ring. Refrigerate while you make the filling.
Filling
- In the bowl of your stand mixer, put the cream cheese, whipping cream, sugar and vanilla extract. Mix with the paddle on medium speed. Don't forget to scrape the bowl from time to time.
- Melt the white chocolate in the microwave or over a double boiler.
- When the cream cheese is smooth, pour in the white chocolate quickly and keep mixing.
- In a small pot, put the agar agar, ½ tbsp whipping cream and water. Heat on medium heat, whisking constantly, to allow the agar agar to melt. Then bring to a boil.
- Pour in the cream cheese mix quickly, keep mixing for a minute, scrape the bowl again and mix for one last minute.
- Pour on top of the brown butter crust and smooth with an offset spatula or with the spine of a long knife.Refrigerate for 4 hours or overnight.
Passion fruit sauce
- Cut the passion fruits in half and scoop out the pulp in a small pot. Rinse and dry the shells if you want to use them to decorate your plates.
- In a pot, bring to a boil the passion fruit pulp, sugar and orange juice.
- Mix the cornstarch with the cold water, and whisk it in the pot once it's boiling.
- Boil for a minute or two, while whisking, set aside.
Decorating
- When the cheesecake is ready to be unmolded, put the whipping cream and the sugar in the bowl of your stand mixer and whisk until medium peak.Place in a piping bag with the tip of your choice.
- Unmold the cheesecake carefully, pipe the chantilly on top and sprinkle with lime zest.
- Serve with the passion fruit sauce drizzled on top or poured into the passion fruit halves.