Jiggly Japanese Cheesecake

PREPARATION

1. To retrieve your cake in its entirety, grease and line your 7-inch cake tin with baking/parchment paper at the bottom and on the sides. If baking with the inner pot, grease the pot with butter at the bottom and 3 inches up the sides. You do not need to preheat the pressure cooker.
2. For the sides, make sure your side baking parchments extend 1 cm (no more) above the height of your pan. If the paper is too tall, the side of the cake will collapse as it shrinks; too short and the cake overflows over the rim.
3. Have an exit plan for how to remove the baking tin (e.g. lift one side with a fork, then pull it out with a mittened hand).
4. Bake time is around 59 minutes. Prep usually takes 30 to 40 minutes, so block out about 2 hours for this cake.
5. Look up "how to fold whipped egg whites into batter" before you start — folding takes practice.
6. Before you start baking, add the corn starch to the flour and mix well. Sift three times if time permits, at least once if not.

BATTER

1. Let the cream cheese and butter soften to room temperature (about 3 hours, or 10 seconds in the microwave).
2. Separate the egg yolks from the egg whites. Use a clean, water-free bowl for the whites; do not let any yolk into the whites, or the whipping will fail. Add cream of tartar to the whites before whipping.
3. Mix together the melted cream cheese and butter first, with no lumps. Add some of the milk if too thick. Once no longer warm, add the egg yolks and vanilla extract, a bit at a time.
4. Sift the flour and corn starch into the batter bit by bit, in 3-4 batches, mixing well after each addition.
5. Sift the combined mixture into another bowl.

WHIPPING THE EGG WHITES

1. Whip the 5 egg whites with 1/4 tsp cream of tartar on low speed for 1 full minute.
2. Add the 100 g sugar in multiple batches as you whip — the first third only after 1 minute of beating. Gradually add the rest and stop once you have stiff peaks and a condensed-milk consistency (about 5 to 7 minutes).

COMBINING THE TWO

1. Take a quarter of the whipped egg whites (more like foam) and add it to the batter, mixing any way you like to dilute it.
2. Fold the remaining whites into the batter in one-third portions at a time (turn the bowl a quarter each fold; about 20 folds per third).
3. Pour the batter into the greased inner pot or the lined baking tin. Put the tin straight into the inner pot — no trivet, no water; the tin is in direct contact with the inner pot.
4. Lift and drop the pan (or gently bang the side of the pot with a wooden spoon) a few times to remove bubbles until the surface is smooth.
5. Select BAKE mode, set the timer for 59 minutes, keep the regulator at SEAL. When it counts down to around the 20-minute mark, turn the regulator to BAKE (it may hiss a little).

GETTING THE CAKE OUT If baking with the tin: once done, open the lid, snap a picture, then close it and leave in Keep Warm for 2 minutes (this open-and-shut step prevents too much shrinkage). Then open the lid and remove the cake. Remove the side parchment, turn it over, remove the bottom parchment. If baking directly in the inner pot: once done, open the lid, keep it in Keep Warm, and once shrinking has stabilised, remove and turn it upside down to take the cake out.