We had the cafe. I could make the cheesecakes. Now what did we have to do to bring those together. Originally The Haven had an oven, but they found that due to its size it had to be vented in order to pass inspection The building we are in is 100 years old, mostly brick, 2 story and the kitchen area was somewhere in the middle of it. Therefore it would cost great gobs of cash in order to vent the large oven, so it had to go.
This left us with a problem. How do we make cheesecakes on-site? The answer was easy enough, get a small countertop convection oven. We found the largest size that we could have without having to vent and we bought it. But this presented another problem. I use nine inch spring form pans that are approximately three inches tall. The inner cavity of the oven had 3 racks (spaced somewhere between two and three inches), and was barely eighteen inches wide. I could fit two nine inch pans on one rack, but they would be touching each other and the sides of the oven which any baker knows is a big no-no. Plus, with three inch tall pans, I could only use two racks, one of which was needed for the water bath.
We checked out eight inch cake pans that were two inches tall, and I could fit four of them in the oven with a water bath, so that would be fine. The problem is that eight inch spring form pans apparently have to be ordered, and they come mostly in the three inch height. However we found some that are the right height and they have been ordered.
Another necessary item in making cheesecakes is a stand mixer. No problem, I have one of those... but wait, all kitchen equipment must be rated for commercial use! There are only a small handful of tabletop stand mixers that are commercial rated, and they are much, much cheaper when purchased through the internet. So the mixer is ordered.
We took ownership of The Haven on Saturday night. The Haven is closed on Sunday and we were to re-open Monday morning as The Haven Cafe with at least some of the changes in-place. One of those changes was the inclusion of cheesecake on the menu. Our shopping was done. We had the oven and the ingredients, but no pans and no mixer. Fortunately I had eight inch cake pans that I could use, and we were able to borrow a mixer to use until we could get our new one.
I had a lot of obstacles to overcome. Every baker can tell you that any change to any part of a recipe, even down to the equipment used in the process can create problems. I am used to baking cheesecake in my home oven, with nine inch spring form pans, and using my own mixer. Now I was baking in a new kitchen, with a small convection oven, cake pans, and a mixer I wasn't used to.
For my inaugural batch of cheesecake I chose to make Key Lime. Oh key lime. My wife Jan requested that I make key lime cheesecake one time for her friend's baby shower. No problem until she also requested that I make them green! I learned from Alton Brown that key lime is NOT green, and anything key lime that is green has had food coloring added, and there's just no reason for that. Though I was pretty adamant, in the end Jan won because the cheesecakes had to "match" the shower. Those cheesecakes came out the strangest shade of green that I had ever seen! This time there was NO food coloring involved.
My cheesecakes were in the oven. The water bath was bubbling away and everything was going well. I cleaned up and went out into the dining area to help out for a while as the cheesecakes baked. After maybe 20 minutes I went back in the kitchen and found that the cheesecakes had risen quite a bit! This is a problem, as it means that the oven is too hot and the liquid in the cheesecake is turning to steam. Steam around a cheesecake is good. Steam IN a cheesecake is bad! I turned the temperature down and let the cheesecakes finish cooking. Since these were in cake pans rather than spring form pans I had made a parchment paper "caddy" to lift them out when they had cooled. It worked fairly well, but the paper had folded over into the top of the cheesecakes, and this caused the tops and sides to be pretty uneven. Additionally one of the cheesecakes cracked! I wasn't very happy with my inaugural batch of cheesecake, but I had expected going into this that I would have problems. One of the cheesecakes was good enough to sell, and the one that cracked... well it could be used as samples!
I only had two eight inch cake pans, so I had to bring in a nine inch spring form pan in order to get one more cheesecake out before Monday morning. This was to be my signature flavor, vanilla bean. I stumbled on the idea for this recipe in an attempt to make a "Boston Cream" cheesecake and have loved it ever since. I now knew that the oven cooked hotter than my oven at home, due to the smaller cavity size and method of heating. Convection ovens use a fan to move the hot air around the oven rather than a regular oven that uses a flame or electric coil that radiates heat from the top or bottom of the oven. With the oven temperature set lower my vanilla bean cheesecake came out perfectly. The top was smooth and of a uniform color, and as far as I could tell the consistency was spot-on.
That is it for this entry. I go back into the kitchen tonight to add a new flavor to the menu and stock up the dessert case for the weekend.
I'll leave you with a tip. In this entry I mentioned the water bath. When making any type of custard, to help it cook evenly you have to use a water bath. Temperatures in an oven vary greatly, and since water never gets above the boiling point, whatever is in the water cooks more evenly. With my cheesecakes I struggled for many years and no matter what I did, from wrapping the base of the pan in foil to buying special "no leak" pans, I couldn't keep the water from seeping into the crust of the cheesecake! Finally I tried something new. Rather than put the cheesecake in the water bath, I put the pan of water on the rack under the cheesecake! This still filled the oven cavity with steam which helps not only in keeping the temperature even, but in keeping the top of the cheesecake moist. It probably isn't quite as good for the consistency of the cheesecake as a true water bath, but at least I don't have soggy crusts anymore!
In my next post I introduce a new flavor to the mix... and maybe add a photo or two!
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