Soufflé Chocolate Cheese Cake

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Way back when I was a chef and young cooks asked me for suggestions and advise what to cook during competitions or job-interviews, the most difficult suggestion was usually the dessert course.
Most young cooks (and many old chefs) are not very skilled in pastry, so a quick, easy, foolproof, yet impressing and delicious dessert is usually a problem.
(When I was judging applicants both for sous chef positions and for chef instructor positions, 99 out of 100 desserts presented was crème brûlée) 😦
As for myself, although during my 3.5 year apprentice ship I was schooled for 6 months in classic french pastry, preparing the stuff was never something I enjoyed a lot.
(On the other hand, eating it is a whole different story) 🙂
The following little gem – Soufflé Chocolate Cheese Cake is a wonderful solution to the dilemma and it helped many of the cooks I mentored to be able to serve a dessert that could stand up to the rest of their presentation. It is so simple and quick to prepare that to this day I prepare it often for myself at home. Besides being easy to prepare, it also lends itself to variations, such as adding fruit, dark chocolate instead of white, or eliminating the chocolate altogether and replacing it with condensed milk. You can also use a spring mold instead of muffin cups to make it into a super-light, regular-sized cake. Because I had a bit of leftover chocolate pudding in the fridge from yesterday, I added it to 3 of the 6 mini-cakes.
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Bon Appétit ! Life is Good !
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Souffle Chocolate Cheese Cake

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Preparation :
To read instructions, hover over pictures
To enlarge pictures and read instructions, click on pictures
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: melt 8oz chocolate in double boiler

: melted chocolate

: to 8 oz cream cheese add the chocolate

: divide 6 eggs into yolks and whites (make sure the bowls are absolutely clean and free of fat)

: completely incorporate the chocolate into the cream cheese

: add the egg yolks, incorporate

: stir until smooth

: whisk the egg whites to stiff peaks

: add 1/4 of the egg-whites to the cream cheese /chocolate/egg yolk mixture, stir until smooth

: fold-in the rest of the egg-whites

: ready to fill into molds

: lightly spray molds with cooking spray (or brush with butter if preferred)

: fill molds to the rim, add filling if desired

: bake at 350F for 45 minutes (or until a inserted toothpick comes out clean); – pls note that cakes will rise like souffles, then, while cooling, deflate back to their original size