Flaky and buttery pastry filled with a smooth and creamy cheese filling. These Hokkaido baked cheese tarts are the perfect balance between sweet and salty.

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Background
What are hokkaido cheese tarts?
Tips for making the crust
Tips for making the filling
Adjusting the bake time to your preferred filling consistency
How to enjoy
📖 Recipe
💬 Comments

Background

I'm just going to start this blog post off with some cheese appreciation. I'm sure many of you feel the same way as me, I love cheese. Whether it be on a cheese platter with crackers, melted on top of my pizza, or in the form of a dessert I don't know how it can possibly go wrong.

Now that we've got that out of the way let's move onto the recipe! I absolutely love cheese tarts. At first I thought they were just mini cheesecakes with an out of scale cheese to crust ratio. That was before I had an amazing cheese tart. Flashback to my trip to Japan in January 2017... the best Hokkaido baked cheese tarts...

What are hokkaido cheese tarts?

Originating in Hokkaido Japan these tarts were originally created to showcase the cheesy taste of Hokkaido dairy. The tart shell is buttery and the cheese filling is firm on the outside and gooey in the centre. Enjoyed warm, cold or frozen these tarts are for everyone!

Tips for making the crust

To ensure your pastry turns out flakey, buttery and absolutely delicious keep these tips in mind!

Everything should be cold

The butter, milk and eggs in these tarts should all be chilled before hand, and kept as cold as possible whilst making the pastry. This ensures that the butter doesn't melt into the dough. The little pockets of butter create flakiness when baked.

Chilling the dough before baking

This is an important step as it prevents the shells from shrinking too much. If the shells shrink too much there won't be enough volume for the cheese filling, throwing the balance between tart shell and filling off.

Tips for making the filling

To ensure that the cheese tarts have a smooth, cheesy, and creamy texture it is important to follow these tips.

Melt the cheeses well: The cheeses are what causes lumps in the filling. Making sure that all the cheeses have melted into each other ensures a smooth filling.
Sieving: If you find that the cheese filling is still lumpy you can pass it through a fine meshed sieve

Thickening: It is important to keep cooking the cheese mixture over the double boiler. This creates a creamier texture. Keep mixing until slightly thickened.
Chilling: Make sure to chill the filling before piping it into the shells. Chilling the cheese filling makes it a lot easier to pipe into the tart shells, allowing you to fill the tarts to their full capacity.

Adjusting the bake time to your preferred filling consistency

Does the runny centre of a cheese tart make it unsafe to eat?

I find that the best cheese tarts have edges that are slightly firmer, resembling a cheesecake. The centre is then half-baked with a slightly runny consistency. Although the centre of the cheesecake is half-baked it is perfectly safe to eat as it has been cooked during the custard making process and then heated in the oven.

I prefer a firmer cheese tart, how long should I bake it?

If you prefer the centre of your cheese tart to be firmer bake the tart for an additional 3 minutes, or until the tart doesn't jiggle anymore. Make sure you keep a close eye on your tarts as they are being baked at a high temperature. If you find that the tarts are starting to brown too quickly turn the oven off and leave the cheese tarts in there until the filling reaches your desired texture.

How to enjoy

The unique part about Hokkaido cheese tarts is the ways you can enjoy them. Either warm, chilled or frozen.

Warm

How to reheat my cheese tart?

If you enjoy your cheese tarts warm they are best straight out of the oven, as this doesn't compromise their texture. If you want to reheat your tarts, pop them in a toaster oven for 3-4 minutes. Just be aware that this will cook the cheese filling a little more.

Chilled

The easiest way to enjoy your cheese tarts and personally my favorite way to eat them! Chilling the cheese tarts intensifies the cheese flavor whilst adding an extra creamy texture to the filling. At this temperature, they resemble a super creamy cheesecake with a slightly cheesier flavor and crumblier crust.

All you need to do is remove it from the fridge and enjoy!

Frozen

An interesting way to enjoy these that you don't usually see with other desserts. Cheese tarts can be eaten frozen because of the half-baked cheese texture. They don't freeze up rock solid and the texture it almost like ice-cream. Delicious!

Let's Get Baking!

Let's get to baking some cheese tarts. These tarts are very much reliant on the ingredients as it was created to showcase the high-quality Hokkaido dairy. I find that a good quality parmesan cheese with Philadelphia cream cheese creates the best-tasting Hokkaido cheese tart. Play around with the flavors and find your best cheese tart.

If you liked this recipe make sure to leave me a comment and rating down below, I would love to know how you went.

Also, don't forget to tag me on Instagram @catherine.desserts and hashtag #cattycakes so I can see and share your desserts. Follow me on Facebook, Pinterest, Youtube, and TikTok for more of my baking creations and updates! Until next time... happy baking!

📖 Recipe

Hokkaido Cheese Tart Recipe

Print Recipe

★★★★★

5 from 3 reviews

Flaky and buttery pastry filled with a smooth and creamy cheese filling. These Hokkaido baked cheese tarts are the perfect balance between sweet and salty.

Author: Catherine Zhang
Prep Time: 40 minutes
Cook Time: 10 minutes
Total Time: 50 minutes
Yield: 9 Tarts 1x
Category: Tart
Method: Intermediate
Cuisine: Japanese

Ingredients

Scale

Tart Crust

120 g All purpose flour (1 cup)
25 g Granulated sugar (2 tbsp)
70 g Unsalted butter (¼ cup 2 tsp)
1 Egg yolk

Cream Cheese Filling

150 g Cream cheese (5.3 oz)
50 g Smooth ricotta or mascarpone (3.5 oz)
40 g Parmesan cheese (0.9 oz)
30 g Butter (2 tbsp)
100 g Milk (⅓ cup 1 tbsp)
60 g Icing sugar (½ cup 2 tbsp)
7 g Corn starch/Cornflour (1 tbsp)
1 Egg
1 tsp Vanilla extract
Pinch Salt

Egg Wash

1 Egg yolk
2 tbsp Whole milk

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Instructions

Tart Crust

Grease and dust your tart molds (I used egg tart tins, but you can use a cupcake or muffin tin!)
Place flour, sugar, salt and butter in the bowl and rub between your fingertips until the dough resembles sands
Add the yolk and knead until a smooth dough
If too wet add a little more flour, if too dry add a splash of milk
Divide the dough into 9 portions and line your tart tins
Dock the bases of the tart shells with a fork and place the lined tart shells in the freezer for at least 30 minutes
Preheat the oven to 180C
Bake the tart shells for 20-30 minutes, until lightly golden brown
Remove from the oven and press down any air bubbles with a spoon

Cream Cheese Filling

Combine the cream cheese, ricotta/mascarpone, parmesan, milk and butter in a large heatproof bowl
Melt the cheeses over a double boiler, mix until smooth
Add the eggs, vanilla, cornstarch and sugar, and continue stirring the mixture for 10 minutes or until thickened
Remove from heat and cover with cling wrap. Chill in the fridge for at least 1 hour until chilled.

Assembly

Preheat the grill to high
Remove from fridge and fill a piping bag with the cheese mixture
Pipe the cheese mixture into the blind-baked tart shells
Make the egg wash by whisking together the egg yolks and milk
Brush the tops of the cheese mixture with the egg wash
Grill or broil for 6-7 minutes, or until they are golden brown (you can also use a blowtorch)
Enjoy warm or chilled!

Keywords: cheese, cream cheese, cheese tart, hokkaido, tart

The Best Hokkaido Baked Cheese Tarts

Background

What are hokkaido cheese tarts?