Say hello to the ultimate smooth and luxuriously creamy healthy cheesecake recipe.
This. is. what. dreams. are. made. of.
Lighter and creamier than Cheesecake Factory – with a third of the calories and sugar!
I figured today—my birthday—is the perfect time to share one of my own personal favorite recipes. When I say this healthy cheesecake is good, you know it has to be really good… because I do not take my cheesecake lightly.
I’m exceedingly selective when it comes to good cheesecake.
So many cheesecake recipes out there are not only way too sweet (seriously, a cup and a half of sugar in a cheesecake is too much!) but also too firm. The perfect cheesecake should never be overpowered by sugar, and every creamy bite should absolutely MELT in your mouth.
2018 Edit – There’s now a Brownie Cheesecake Recipe too, because of course there had to be a chocolate version!
I ate my birthday cheesecake in my pajamas.
For breakfast.
Happy birthday, indeed!
Can we talk about the sugar for a minute?
It’s called cheese cake for a reason.
Many cheesecake recipes call for such a large quantity of sugar that the bold and savory cheese flavor is lost and sugar ends up being the only thing you taste. If I wanted to eat something that tasted like sugar, I would skip the cheesecake and eat a bowl of frosting.
(Not that eating a bowl of frosting isn’t also delicious in its own right…)
Sugar was the first thing I knew I could slash when it came to creating a healthier cheesecake recipe. I started by researching traditional cheesecake recipes to get a feel for how much sugar, cream cheese, vanilla, and other basic ingredients usually go into cheesecake. And then I played around quite a bit.
A lot goes into my recipe creations!
With this particular cheesecake recipe, I also knew I wanted to omit all the heavy cream called for in traditional cheesecake recipes and replace it with something much healthier.
Since cheesecake should have a subtle tang to begin with, I came up with the idea to use yogurt, and it worked perfectly!
Also left out were the eggs normally found in cheesecake recipes, which took a bit of trial to find the perfect replacement since eggs add moisture and bind recipes together.
Since there’s nothing more frustrating than having to visit multiple health food stores to locate all the ingredients in a recipe, I knew I wanted this healthy cheesecake to call only for ingredients you can find at a regular grocery store.
*Crust is the recipe from this post: Vegan Cheesecake Recipe
Healthy Cheesecake Of Your Dreams
Ingredients
- 24 oz cream cheese, such as trader joes vegan
- 2 cups plain yogurt, such as coconutmilk yogurt
- 2 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
- 1 tbsp cornstarch - or here's a Keto Cheesecake Recipe
- 1/2 cup sugar or maple syrup, honey, or xylitol for sugar-free
- pinch uncut stevia OR 2 additional tbsp sugar
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 F. Fill a 9x13 pan about halfway with water and place it on your oven’s lower rack. Bring cream cheese to room temperature. Using a blender or hand blender, beat all cheesecake ingredients just until smooth. (Do not overbeat, as this would introduce air bubbles that would burst in the oven and thus cause cracking.) Smooth into a 9-inch springform pan, either lined with a crust or without. Place on the middle rack above the other pan. Bake 30 minutes, and do not open the oven during this time. When the time is up, leave the oven door closed and turn off the heat. Leave in the closed oven for an additional 5 minutes. Then remove—it will still look underdone—and let cool 20 minutes before placing the still-underdone cheesecake in the refrigerator. It’s important not to put the cheesecake right from the oven to the fridge, because you want it to cool gradually so it doesn’t crack. Chill at least 6 hours, during which time it will firm up to the proper texture. Leftovers covered in the fridge will last around 3-4 days. That is… if you don’t eat it all first!View Cheesecake Nutrition Facts
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Hi I made this cheesecake yesterday and it is wonderful! Could you tell me how many servings are in this cheesecake? I looked at the nutrition facts and didn’t see.
Yield is underneath the ingredients in her recipes… 8-12 slices for this one. She typically bases the nutrition facts on the highest yield (12 pieces in this case) and the sugar free option, omitting optional ingredients.
LOOKS AMAZING!
I want healthier cheesecake!
Val
So I’ve got this in the oven. Unbaked, it tastes yummy! It’s chunky though. I probably should have let the cream cheese come to room temp first, right? Also, is it really 2 1/2 *tablespoons* of vanilla, not teaspoons? I hope so, ’cause that’s what I put in. I can’t wait for it to be done.. in almost 7 hours! 🙂
So, even with the extra vanilla and the lumpiness (my fault on that one), this cheesecake was fantastic! I’m not normally a big cheesecake fan (I like it, but it’s not my favorite), so I was pushing myself out on a limb making this for just my household. It was so delicious and creamy. I put a little strawberry freezer jam on some of my servings, though it really didn’t need anything. My husband said this might be the best cheesecake he’s ever had! Thank you Katie!
I clicked the Include Rating button, but it didn’t show where I can rate it… I give it 5 stars!
So happy to know! I’d actually emailed you when I saw your initial comment about the vanilla extract. Not sure if you got my reply, but I’m really happy it turned out well anyway!
For the rating system, something has been wrong with it for about a week, and I’m really hoping the web designers will get back to me about it soon… I’ve been trying to fix it myself, but so far to no avail.
I did get your reply, but I wasn’t sure if I responded to it, if it would go back to you as an email or not at all. Thank you so much for replying to me 🙂 it means a lot. I truly love your blog. I’m signed up on your email list, but I check your blog before I check my email every morning 🙂
Happy birthday!!! I’m glad you enjoyed your cake!!!
Healthy cheesecake of dreams: do you use real cream cheese or tofu?
She uses non-dairy cream cheese. It might work with tofu… I’m not sure. Please let us know if you try it.
Either real cream cheese (full-fat) or tofutti will work fine in this.
Hey…today it’s my birthday! I was looking for a healthy cheesecake recipe to celebrate with…and found this! Looking forward to trying it out! Thanks for all your great recipes!
What crust do you use with the healthy cheesecake?
She mentioned a few times in earlier comments that it is a crust recipe in her book and she did not want readers to feel like she was pushing the book too much, so she was afraid to mention it. https://lett-trim.today/faq-page/chocolate-covered-katie-cookbook/%3C/a%3E%3C/p%3E
Great recipe katie! I don’t have access to non-dairy yogurt though. Can I use pureed firm tofu instead?
Why do we need to put the pan with water into the oven?
KATIE! I cannot believe this is healthy cheesecake. It tastes SOOOOOOOOO good!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Is it bad to eat the whole thing at once? 😉