Käsewähe - Savory Cheesecake from Switzerland
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When I moved to Switzerland in 2015, I had to learn some food vocabulary: suddenly I was surrounded by Gipfeli (croissants), Baumnüssen (walnuts), Silserli (lye roll), Znüni (second breakfast) and also Wähen. A Wähe is a simple cake or tart, either sweet with fruit or savory with cheese. After a short time I took a liking to it and it became a popular option for a quick lunch at the bakery near the office.
The cheese tart is similar to a quiche, with a very simple filling of cheese, cream, egg and milk, lightly seasoned. It is very quick to prepare and you can easily make a small side salad while the tart is baking in the oven.
The recipe is based on that of Swissmilk. The standard version calls for no other ingredients in the filling, but I like to add some fried onions. If you’re in a hurry, you can use a ready-made pastry instead of making your own.
Recipe #
Hearty cheesecake / Käsewähe
45 minutes
4 portions
Ingredients #
For the dough:
- 80 g butter
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 200 g wheat flour
- 75 g water
For the topping:
- 1 onion
- 1 garlic clove
- 1 tablespoon oil
- 300 g grated cheese, for example a mixture of Gruyère and Emmental
- 150 g milk
- 250 g single cream
- 3 eggs
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 pinch of pepper
- 1 pinch of nutmeg
Salad as a side dish:
- 1 large head of lettuce (about 250 g)
- about 200 g cherry tomatoes
- 1/3 cucumber (about 200 g)
- 80 g oil
- 40 g vinegar
- 10 g mustard
- 2 g sugar
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 pinch of pepper
Directions #
- Prepare the dough: heat the butter in the microwave or in a saucepan. Add the other dough ingredients and mix to form a dough.
- For the topping, peel and chop the onion and garlic. Fry in a pan with oil until the onions are translucent.
- Meanwhile, make the rest of the topping: In a large bowl, combine the grated cheese, milk and cream. Whisk the eggs and add to the mixture. Season to taste with salt, pepper and nutmeg. Finally, add the fried onion and garlic and mix again to form a homogeneous mixture.
- Line a round baking tin with baking paper, spread the dough on top, press down a little and form a rim. Spread the cheese mixture on top.
- Bake in a fan oven at 200-220°C for about 30-35 minutes.
- While the cheese tart is baking, prepare the salad: Wash and clean the lettuce. Wash and chop the cucumber and tomato. Mix the oil with the vinegar, mustard, sugar, salt and pepper to make a vinaigrette. You can add the cucumber and tomatoes directly to the vinaigrette, and the salad itself just before serving.
- Remove the golden-brown cheese tart from the oven and cut into slices. Serve with the salad.
Carbon Footprint #
A round baking dish with a diameter of 28 cm makes about four portions. I take the amount for such a baking dish and halve it to get the equivalent of two portions. (The remaining pieces can easily be re-baked briefly.)
In total, two portions of the savory cheesecake with salad have an estimated carbon footprint of 2621 g.
This ranks it number 45 out of 53 recipes published on the blog so far in terms of estimated carbon footprint.
Overall, it is one of the 20% of recipes with the highest climate impact - at least 80% of recipes cause fewer emissions than this dish. 😞When it comes to ingredients, butter, cheese and cream are of course the most noticeable: All three dairy products have a relatively high greenhouse effect due to the climate footprint of cattle farming. The side salad, on the other hand, is almost negligible: Although lettuce, tomatoes, and cucumbers together make up about one-third of the weight of the ingredients, they account for only about 5% of the carbon footprint.
| ingredient | carbon footprint per kg | carbon footprint (in g) for 2 servings | % of ingredients | % of CO2 emissions |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Butter | 9.0 | 360 | 4% | 13% |
| Salt | 0.7 | 0 | 0% | 0% |
| Wheat flour | 0.9 | 89 | 10% | 3% |
| Onion | 0.2 | 8 | 4% | 0% |
| Garlic | 0.5 | 1 | 0% | 0% |
| Oil | 3.2 | 16 | 1% | 1% |
| Cheese | 6.0 | 900 | 16% | 33% |
| Milk | 1.4 | 105 | 8% | 4% |
| Cream | 4.2 | 525 | 13% | 19% |
| eggs | 3.0 | 225 | 8% | 8% |
| Salt | 0.7 | 1 | 0% | 0% |
| Pepper | 1.4 | 1 | 0% | 0% |
| Nutmeg | 1.1 | 1 | 0% | 0% |
| Salad | 0.3 | 23 | 8% | 1% |
| Cherry tomatoes | 0.8 | 80 | 10% | 3% |
| Cucumber | 0.4 | 40 | 10% | 1% |
| Oil | 3.2 | 128 | 4% | 5% |
| Vinegar | 1.4 | 27 | 2% | 1% |
| Mustard | 1.4 | 7 | 1% | 0% |
| Sugar | 0.9 | 1 | 0% | 0% |
| Salt | 0.7 | 0 | 0% | 0% |
| Pepper | 1.4 | 1 | 0% | 0% |
| Warm butter | 14 | 1% | ||
| Sauté the onion | 1 | 0% | ||
| Bake the tart | 149 | 6% |
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