Red Bean Cheesecake with Matcha Green Tea Powder Whip Cream, Raspberry Gelee, and White Chocolate-Sesame Brittle

Having been so inspired by making my first real dessert a couple weeks ago, I wanted to make another.  This time, I knew I wanted to make a cheesecake, but then thought about the plating as well.  

Plating a slice of cheesecake would just be so blah.  Imagine just a regular slice of cheese cake sitting on a plate.  Yes, it can be appealing because it is cheesecake and there are so many variations of it.  Lets face it, who would not drool over a picture of cheesecake.  I wanted to take it a step further with it.  This was the easy part for me compared to what kind of cheesecake I wanted to make.  I did not want to do traditional flavored cheesecakes so I thought outside the box a bit and went with Asian flavors.  

Red beans came to mind and I know I have never seen a red bean cheesecake because I have eaten my fair share of them.  What I did was, pureed some red beans and sweetened it and mixed it with a basic cheesecake mix.  I was hoping more for a deeper red color, but it turned out perfect because it would have just blended in with the other component of the plate...the raspberry gelee.

Thinking of more Asian flavors, I though of a green tea whip cream.  To achieve different colors ofnthe plate, I turned to matcha green tea powder for color and flavor.  

To go a little bit more of an Asian flare, I melted some white chocolate and added some sesame seeds to it and made a white chocolate sesame "brittle"

The cheesecake was of course prepared the night before for plating the next day.  I had a slight idea on how I wanted it to be plated, but did not expect it to turn out the way it did.  

All the flavors played very well together.  I thought it turned out pretty well considering my lack of experience with dessert!