Low calorie dessert: Cottage cheesecake pie

Cheesecake is one of my favourite desserts. But I always hesitate to make it because there is too much fat :(

I happened to find this cottage cheese ( I am not very familiar with cheese and only buy Kraft Fat Free Singles for my breakfast), which is also made from skim milk and has only 100 calories/125g due to its low content of carbohydrates but high percentage of protein. That can be a good substitute for cream cheese, I thought.

Step 1: Pie crust

In a mixing bowl, combine 1/4 cup cake flour and 3/4 cup all purpose flour, add 4 tbsp cold trans-fat-free margarine in small portion and scatter them evenly over flour mixture. Shake the mixing bowl to have flour well covered with margarine. The combination of margarine and flour leads to very small peas and no white flour can be found any more.

Add ice water tsp by tsp, shake the bowl to ensure water is absorbed thoroughly. Totally, 5 tbsp ice water is added.

Handle the dough as little as possible. Both the stretching of the dough and the warmth from your hands will further the development of gluten -- long, stringy protein molecules that form when flour is blended with liquid -- resulting in a tough dough that's difficult to roll out. (By Martha Stewart)

Just shake the bowl, if there is some flour sticking at the bottom, scoop it with a rubber spatula.

Transfer the loose dough to a sandwich bag, seal the bag and shape the dough into a flat disk and chill it for 1 hour at least.

Dust the board and rolling pin, brush excess flour.

Transfer the chilled dough on the board and roll it out into a circle, which is 2 to 3 inches larger than the 9 inch pie pan. Transfer it to the pie pan, shape it well.

Brush some water and bake the pie crust in preheated oven (400F) for 6 minutes.

Step 2: Cottage cheesecake filling

Whisk 3/4 cup cottage cheese to smooth. Combine 2/3 cup plain yogurt, 1 tbsp cake flour, 2 tbsp brown sugar, 1/4 tsp salt, 1 whole egg, 1 egg white and 1 tbsp lemon juice. Strain through a sieve and smooth the residue with a rubber spatula until all filling can pass through the sieve.

Pour the mixture into the baked crust, sprinkle some raisin or other berries, and bake in preheated oven (350F) for 35 minutes, or until the edge is slightly golden-browned.

Turn off the power and let the pie cool in the oven so that the surface of the pie will not crack.

Chill at least 1 hour before serving.