Welcome to Bon Appétit Bake Club, a community of curious bakers. Each month senior test kitchen editors Jesse Szewczyk and Shilpa Uskokovic share a must-make recipe and dive deep on why it works. Come bake and learn with us—ask questions, share pics, listen to our podcast, and lots more here. And don’t forget to join the Bake Club Group chat over on Substack.
This month I shared my new recipe for karpatka, the drag queen of Polish desserts. I spent weeks developing my version, a hybrid that swapped the typical whipped-cream-lightened pastry cream for a no-bake cheesecake. While delicious from the beginning, creating a filling that was sturdy enough to slice and stand on its own without weeping away into a puddle proved challenging. I tried increasing the amount of cream cheese, but that made it skew too tangy. That’s when Hana Asbrink, our deputy food editor, stepped in and suggested I stabilize it with some gelatin. I gave it a spin and, lo and behold, it did the job, setting the filling just enough to hold its own without verging into Jell-O territory.
How to stabilize no-bake cheesecake with gelatin
Intimated by using gelatin? Let me break it down for you. By using a rather conservative amount (just one packet, or roughly 2½ tsp.) you avoid the infamous wiggle-jiggle. This small amount is enough to hold everything in place, while keeping the texture supple and creamy, not firm and bouncy.
To use it, you first need to bloom the gelatin in a little bit of cold water. This process dissolves the gelatin, ensuring there are no lumps in your final product. (Simply adding the gelatin to warm liquid is a recipe for disaster.) Because the filling is made in the mixer, you’ll bloom the gelatin directly in the mixer bowl for one less dish to clean.
Once bloomed, the gelatin will firm up into a puck-like texture—like a scoby that sits atop kombucha—and before you proceed, you’ll need to re-melt it. In my recipe, I simply heat up a small portion of the heavy cream and pour it over the bloomed gelatin, allowing it to remelt before adding the rest of the cheesecake ingredients. The filling sets in the fridge for at least four hours, but preferably overnight. The resulting texture—soft yet sliceable—is magic.
Because you’ll only need one packet of gelatin for this recipe, you’ll be left with three packets to play around with. (Knox brand, the most common brand of gelatin sold in grocery stores, comes with four packets.) Might I suggest making my tiramisu panna cotta, or my homemade marshmallow recipe?
As always, save and then make the karpatka, and let us know how it went in the recipe comment section or in the club chat on Substack. Or if you made something else with gelatin, let us know, too! I’m here for it all.
