Orange Cheesecake (Vegetarian)

I got this on a vegetarian cookbook called Great Vegetarian Dishes: Over 240 recipes from around the world by Kurma dasa. It's a great vegetarian book :). A lot of his recipes information on the restaurants can be found on http://www.kurma.net/.

PREPARATION TIME: 20 minutes
CHILLING TIME: at least 12 hours
YEILDS: one 20 cm (8-inch) cake

Crust
2 cups (500 ml) biscuit crumbs, coarsely ground
1/4 teaspoon (1 ml) ginger powder
1/3 cup (85 ml) melted butter

Filling
350 g (12 ounces) cream cheese
3/4 cup (185 ml) sweetened condensed milk
1/2 cup (125 ml) fresh lemon juice
2 teaspoons (10 ml) grated orange rind

1. To prepared the crust: combine the biscuit crumbs, ginger, and butter. Press the crumb mixture into the base and 2.5 cm (1-inch) up the sides of a 20 cm (8-inch) spring-form pan. Chill the base for 1/2 hour.
2. To prepare the filling: beat the cream cheese until smooth and gradually add the condensed milk, lemon juice, and orange rind, beating thoroughly. Alternatively, the ingredients can be combined in a food processor.
3. Pour the mixture into the crust, smooth it out, and chill to set.

Decorate the cake with the whipped cream and orange segments, or as desired.

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Ingrid's experience on this recipe:

• When I made this cheese cake, I wasn't sure what they meant by biscuit, so I simply crushed the graham crackers to crumbs and mixed them with melted butter to make the crust.
• Orange rind is optional, in my opinion. I didn't have an orange, so I grated lemon rind instead. I suppose you can mix some kind of strawberry flavored powder into the cheese cake filling to make it strawberry flavored, and so forth.
• My cheese cake turned out soggy even after I refrigerated for 12 hours. My suggestion (if the same thing happens to you): put it in the freezer for about 1 hour before serving. Remember not to leave it in the freezer for too long unless you want stone cake :)

(Keywords: dairy, vegetarian, cream cheese, dessert)