Chef Joost
Bokkenpootjestaart
Goat-hoof biscuits made into a whole taart: almond meringue, chocolate, advocaat, and cream, the Dutch bakery counter quietly becoming a dinner-party secret.
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MonChoutaart (Dutch No-Bake Cream Cheese Cake)
Created by
A no-bake birthday cake from the Dutch family table: silver-foil MonChou folded with whipped cream, a cinnamon Bastogne bottom, and cherries dark enough to make the refrigerator feel ceremonial.
Desserts
Dutch
Birthday
Make Ahead
Celebration
30 min
Active Time
0 min cook•24 hr 30 min total
Yield10 to 12 slices
Some dishes enter a family through a silver spoon. MonChoutaart entered many Dutch houses through a silver foil wrapper. In my grandmother's second notebook it was not copied in her careful hand at first; it was a loose supermarket card tucked between appeltaart and birthday coffee stains, which is its own kind of archive. Not every tradition needs four centuries. Some need a refrigerator, a springform tin, and an oma who knew the children would be quiet for the first slice.
But let me tell you a secret. The name already tells you this cake is modern: MonChou is a brand name dressed in French affection, from mon chou, my darling, literally my cabbage (for obvious reasons, the French are allowed these things). The Dutch took that little silver-foil cream cheese, folded it with slagroom, whipped cream, pressed it onto a Bastognekoek bottom fragrant with cinnamon, and gave it the most Dutch task imaginable: wait patiently until the guests arrive.
This is birthday cookery, not pastry school. You need cold cream so it holds air, room-temperature MonChou so it doesn't turn lumpy, and a long chill so the buttered biscuit base and filling become one clean slice. Hou het altijd simpel, always keep it simple. Make it the day before, crown it with dark cherry vlaaivulling, pie filling, and serve it with coffee while somebody asks for the recipe as if they don't already have the same card at home.
MonChoutaart belongs to the Dutch postwar refrigerator table rather than the old provincial bakery: from the 1970s onward, branded dairy, packet whipped-cream stabilizer, and ready-made vlaaivulling made no-bake celebration cakes reliable in ordinary homes. MonChou itself is a Dutch cream-cheese brand sold in small silver-foil blocks; the French phrase mon chou means my darling, literally my cabbage, which explains the name without pretending the cake is older than it is. Its popularity teaches a useful lesson about Dutch culinary history: tradition is not only what survives centuries, but also what home cooks repeat until every birthday table recognizes it.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
Bastogne biscuits
Quantity
250g
unsalted butter
Quantity
125g
melted and cooled slightly
fine salt
Quantity
pinch
MonChou cream cheese
Quantity
400g
at room temperature
white caster sugar or witte basterdsuiker
Quantity
125g
vanilla sugar
Quantity
2 sachets, about 16g total
cold whipping cream (slagroom)
Quantity
500ml
whipped cream stabilizer (slagroomversteviger or Klop-Fix)
Quantity
2 sachets, about 16g total
cherry vlaaivulling or cherry pie filling
Quantity
430g
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| Bastogne biscuits | 250g |
| unsalted buttermelted and cooled slightly | 125g |
| fine salt | pinch |
| MonChou cream cheeseat room temperature | 400g |
| white caster sugar or witte basterdsuiker | 125g |
| vanilla sugar | 2 sachets, about 16g total |
| cold whipping cream (slagroom) | 500ml |
| whipped cream stabilizer (slagroomversteviger or Klop-Fix) | 2 sachets, about 16g total |
| cherry vlaaivulling or cherry pie filling | 430g |
Equipment Needed
- •24cm springform tin
- •Baking paper
- •Electric hand mixer
- •Food processor or rolling pin for crushing biscuits
- •Offset spatula or palette knife
Instructions
- 1
Make the base
Line the base of a 24cm springform tin with baking paper and clamp the ring around it. Crush the Bastogne biscuits to fine crumbs; large pieces make a crust that breaks under the fork. Stir in the melted butter and salt until the crumbs look like wet sand, then press them firmly into the tin with the bottom of a glass. Chill for 20 minutes while you make the filling.
Bastogne matters here. Its cinnamon and caramel keep the cake from tasting like only dairy and cherries; if you must use plain digestives, add 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon and 1 tablespoon dark brown sugar. - 2
Smooth the cheese
Beat the room-temperature MonChou with the caster sugar and vanilla sugar for 2 to 3 minutes, until smooth and glossy. Scrape the bowl well. Cold MonChou stays lumpy, and no amount of hopeful mixing later will make it polite.
- 3
Fold the cream
In a second bowl, whip the cold slagroom, whipped cream, with the stabilizer until it holds firm soft peaks. Fold one third of the cream into the MonChou mixture to loosen it, then fold in the rest gently. You want air held in the filling, not butter made by accident.
- 4
Fill and chill
Spoon the filling onto the chilled biscuit base and smooth the top. Cover the tin and refrigerate for at least 8 hours, but preferably a full day. This is the real work of MonChoutaart: the butter firms, the crumbs settle, and the filling becomes sliceable instead of merely sweet.
Do not freeze it to hurry the setting. The texture turns grainy, and a birthday cake should not taste like impatience. - 5
Top and serve
When the cake is fully set, run a thin knife around the edge and release the springform ring. Spread the cherry vlaaivulling over the top, leaving a small pale rim if you like. Serve cold, in clean wedges, with coffee and the quiet satisfaction of having done almost nothing loudly.
Chef Tips
- •Use full-fat MonChou or a dense full-fat block cream cheese. Tub cream cheese is softer and wetter, and the cake will slump when sliced.
- •The cake is best made a full day ahead. Eight hours will set it, but twenty-four hours gives the Bastogne base time to firm and the dairy to settle into a clean slice.
- •Cherry vlaaivulling is the classic topping. In cherry season, June into July, you can cook sour cherries briefly with sugar and a little potato starch, but outside the season a good jar is an honest Dutch solution.
Advance Preparation
- •Make the cake without the cherry topping up to 24 hours ahead and keep it covered in the refrigerator.
- •Add the cherry topping after the filling has set, preferably within a few hours of serving, for the neatest surface.
- •Leftovers keep 2 to 3 days refrigerated, covered loosely so condensation does not drip onto the cherries.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 155g)
Calories
500 calories
Total Fat
37 g
Saturated Fat
23 g
Trans Fat
1 g
Unsaturated Fat
12 g
Cholesterol
105 mg
Sodium
210 mg
Total Carbohydrates
38 g
Dietary Fiber
1 g
Sugars
29 g
Protein
5 g
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