Using spiced speculoos cookie dough as the crust for this wintery German cheesecake is a heavenly combination. I promise you'll love it!
Spekulatius, or Speculoos in English, is never a cookie my family made from scratch growing up. They were just too common to appear on a saucer when ordering a latte macchiato at a German restaurant or café, and apparently nobody in my family ever questioned that there could be a homemade version of this cookie.
Then one day last month, as I was trying to figure out what Christmassy cheesecake to bake with all the quark I had in my fridge, the idea of using spekulatius cookies as the crust of my Käsekuchen came to me.
And suddenly there I was, making Spekulatius from scratch and scouring Amazon Prime for the cutest, wintery cookie stamps to use for the extra cookie dough this recipe makes. I must say, I love the cookies on their own, but as the crust of this Käsekuchen, they add such warmth and deliciousness.. I'll definitely be making this German cheesecake again!
When baking this cheesecake, make sure to cover it up with some foil about halfway through the baking, so the top of your cake doesn't get too dark.
And yay for extra cookie dough! Make sure to bake it off, too, and serve the cookies along with your Käsekuchen creation. You'll definitely want to use a spring form when making this cake, so if you don't have one already, I can recommend this one. Scroll on down for the recipe.
Spekulatius Käsekuchen: German Speculoos Cheesecake
Ingredients
Spekulatius Crust/Cookies
- 500 g all-purpose flour
- 250 g brown sugar
- 250 g butter
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 2 eggs
- 1 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1 Tbsp ground cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon ground cardamom
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
Ingredients for Käsekuchen Filling
- 240 g butter
- 250 g sugar
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 840 g quark
- 6 eggs 10.5 oz
- 40 g cornstarch
- 40 g all-purpose flour
Instructions
- Bring all cold ingredients to room temperature. Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit or 160 degrees Celsius (convection setting). Prep a spring form with parchment paper on the bottom, and butter the sides.
- For the cookies/crust, beat the brown sugar with the eggs and butter until creamy and combined. Then add salt, cinnamon, cloves and cardamom.
- Sift together the flour and baking powder and add to the mixture and knead until combined.
- Press 400 g of the cookie dough on the bottom and sides of the spring pan (you can cut out and bake the remaining dough on the convection setting at 350 degrees Fahrenheit or 175 degrees Celsius for about 10 minutes.)
- For the cheesecake filling, whisk together the butter, sugar, vanilla and salt until smooth, but do not overwork. Gradually whisk in the eggs.
- Sift together the corn starch and flour, then whisk into the butter-egg mixture until smooth. Lastly, whisk in the quark.
- Pour the mixture onto the cookie crust and bake for about 85 minutes, covering the cheesecake with foil halfway through to prevent it from getting too dark. Allow to rest in the oven for a couple of hours and place in the fridge overnight before serving.
- Serve with more cookies!
Marina
I grew up making spekulatius in the US with Oma and Momand I came here to compare your recipe to mine and it’s a tiny bit different. Probably a regional thing. We use white sugar and add lemon zest and my recipe quantities is somewhere between your 1 and 2 batches. Im going to try your spekulatius in two days. I LOVE your idea of using the cookie as a crust. It’s by far my favorite Christmas cookie. It’s not the prettiest but it’s the best flavor!
dirndlkitchen
I hope you loved my Spekulatius and will try it as a Kösekuchen crust soon! 🙂