Description
Your favorite summer dessert taken to a new level.
Ingredients
Scale
For the crust:
- 2 ½ cups thin salted pretzel sticks
- ¼ cup granulated sugar
- 8 tbsp (1 stick) unsalted butter
For the cream filling:
- 8 oz cream cheese (slightly softened)
- 8 oz mascarpone cheese
- ¼ cup heavy whipping cream
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 tsp fresh lemon juice
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract (homemade if you have it)
For the gelatin top:
- Make your own strawberry “juice” make ahead and chill (you can also use store bought)
- 2 cups fresh strawberries chopped + 1 lb sliced
- 1 cup coconut water
- 1 ½ cups water
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- Juice of ½ of a large lemon
- 2 packets of KNOX gelatin
Instructions
For the crust:
- Place the pretzels in a zip lock bag and crush them into small pieces using a rolling pin.
- Melt the stick of butter.
- Mix the pretzels, melted butter, and sugar in large mixing bowl until well combined.
- Press the mixture into the bottom of a 9”springform pan, leaving the edges slightly higher than the center.
- Bake in a preheated 350° oven for 10 minutes.
- Let cool to room temperature before adding the filling.
For the strawberry “juice”:
- Place all of the ingredients for the gelatin top, minus the gelatin, in a heavy bottom saucepan, and bring to a boil over a medium heat, stirring constantly.
- Boil for 3-4 minutes, then remove from the heat and let steep for 30 minutes.
- Using a fine mesh strainer, strain out the strawberries and any seeds, you should yield 2 cups of juice.
- Chill in the refrigerator while you prepare the rest of the cake.
For the filling:
- Place all of the ingredients for the filling into the bowl of your electric mixer.
- Using the whisk attachment, whisk on high speed for 3-4 minutes until well incorporated.
- Spread the mixture over your cooled crust, again making sure the sides are slightly higher than the center.
- Chill in the refrigerator for 20-30 minute, minimum, while preparing the gelatin.
For the gelatin top:
- Take 1 ½ cups of your strawberry juice and bring it to a boil.
- While doing that, take the remaining ½ cup of cold juice and pour it into a large bowl.
- Sprinkle two packets of KNOX gelatin over the cold juice to let it soften for 1 minute.
- Pour the hot juice over the gelatin mixture and stir for 5 minutes or until completely dissolved.
- Let this mixture sit on the counter for 15-20 minutes to rest and cool.
- Begin arranging the sliced strawberries to cover all of the cream center.
- Once you have a solid layer of berries layed, slowly pour the gelatin mixture over the berries.
- Now you can add the remaining sliced berries being careful to evenly distribute.
- Cover and chill for 3-4 hours or overnight.
- Carefully remove the sides of your springform pan.
- Garnish the top with some fancy cut strawberries and mint leaves before serving. Enjoy!
