Cheesecake is the modern term for what would have been known by the Romans as Libum, consisted of a mixture of cheese, flour and egg. Typically the cakes would be given to the gods as a form of worship and dedication, especially revolving around sacrifice. Ovid best emphasis this which is descriptions of Libum;
‘Cakes are made for the gods.’ (Fasti 3.735)
However this recipe has survived from Cato’s On Agriculture when he describes the basic recipe for a cheese based cake:
‘Grind 2 pounds of cheese thoroughly in a mortar; when it is thoroughly macerated, add 1 pound of wheat flour, or, if you wish the cake to be more dainty, 1/2 pound of fine flour, and mix thoroughly with the cheese. Add 1 egg, and work the whole well. Pat out a loaf, place on leaves, and bake slowly on a warm hearth under a crock.’(De Agriculture 75)
In this recipe there is no specification about the type of cheese needed. This opens the recipe up to several possibilities, for example having a sweet or savoury flavour. But the basis behind the recipe for my cheesecake is a combination of both Ovid and Cato libum due to the addition of honey and use of a neutrally flavoured cheese. In Ovid’s Fasti he writes all about the discovery of honey by Bacchus and the other gods. In book 3 he also writes about the luxury of honey, and tells us that it was added to traditional libum to make it more pleasing for the gods:
‘The father god enjoys honey, and it is right that we should give to its discoverer golden honey infused in hot cakes’ (Fasti 3.761)
For all these reasons I was able to create this recipe to match the idea of a sweet cheesecake.
Ingredients:
120g/ 4oz Plain Flour
225g/ 8oz Ricotta
1 Egg
4 Bay Leaves
120g/ 4oz Runny Honey
Method:
- Preheat oven to 225 fan/ gas mark 7
- Sift flour into a bowl
- Beat the cheese until smooth and then combine with the flour. Add the egg to this mix
- Stir the mixture together until it resembles a sticky dough, adding a bit more flour if the mixture is too wet
- Once the mixture resembles a dough, divide into 4 balls. Place the bay leaves onto a greased baking tray, then add the dough on top
- Cover the dough in a testum fashion (see notes further down on instructions about this)
- Bake for 25-30 minutes
- Whilst the cakes are still hot, scour holes in the surface
- Finally melt the honey in a microwave and then pour over the top of the cakes. Leave for 10 minutes before serving
My thoughts:
Whilst nice, the cheesecake was not what I or any of my testers had expected after hearing the word cheesecake. Instead of the 21st century concept of a cheesecake- a biscuit base and having a rich, creamy, and sweet topping- the Roman cheesecake functions more as a dough or a dumpling with a very dense and close texture.
However this recipe for cheesecake may not have been thought of as odd if I had served it to an Italian audience. Even today, authentic Italian cheesecake recipes vary significantly from what we know, love and buy from our supermarkets. Just like how New York has a distinct style of baked cheesecake, Italy does too, and it is typically made out ricotta and little else, just like this traditional Roman recipe. In fact numerous recipes can be found online, just like this, or sometimes with the addition of what we would recognise as a biscuit base. American celebrity chef Martha Stewart has even written a recipe for her website which is incredible similar, despite the fact that it features a small amount of sugar, and orange vest to add extra flavour alongside the bay leaf.
The idea of pairing the cheesecake with orange was common in many of the modern recipes I looked at, due to the fact that citrus fruits are readily available in Italy. However for an ancient audience I imagine that a Roman cook might have pairing the cheesecake with fruits such as fig and apricot due to the sharp nature of the fruit contrasting the sweetness of the honey glaze.
One of the tricky areas of this recipe was the way in which it needs to be cooked. Traditionally a cheesecake like this would have been cooked by placing red hot coals over a testum (pot) which created a hot oven. However this is incredibly difficult to recreate due to the nature of modern ovens. But Dalby and Grainger in ‘The Classical Cookbook‘, suggest in their recipe for barley rolls that this can be done by placing a casserole dish (or any other form of oven-safe dish) or even a plant pot over the top of a baking tray. This would have helped to create a similar technique as how the cheesecakes would have been cooked authentically. It is also thought that traditional testum would have contained a hole at the top, so that air could circulate around helping the cooking process. Therefore in my recipe I used a large casserole dish, which I took off during the penultimate 5 minutes in the oven, to allow the dough to crisp up as I presume it would have done when baked in a testum.
Overall I would consider the recreation of a sweet Roman cheesecake to be easy to do, as none of the methods or ingredients that are involved are too different from a modern style of cooking. I think it’s also significant that modern recipes can still be found in Italy and also across the world, therefore showing how successful the legacy of Cato’s recipe is.
Real Roman Recipes 