Can i substitute frozen berries when the cheesecake calls for fresh?

Question

I would like to make the following cheesecake recipe. It uses fresh raspberries to add flavor. I only have access to frozen berries. I can defrost the frozen ones I have, but there's a lot more liquid now than in the fresh ones. Can I substitute frozen berries?

Also, if I wanted to add berry juice to add more berry flavor (and a nice color) would that work?

Recipe from here: http://s-vick.blogspot.co.za/2013/04/gordon-ramsays-ultimate-cookery-course_11.html

550g cream cheese, at room temperature.
160g Caster Sugar.
3 Eggs, lightly beaten.
2 tbsp Plain Flour.
Finely grated zest of 1 Lemon.
200g Raspberries.

Preheat the oven to 180C and butter a 23 cm spring-foam cake tin. Beat together the cream cheese and sugar. Add the beaten eggs bit by bit until combined. Add the flour and lemon zest, then fold through the raspberries.
Spoon the mixture into the prepared cake tin, tapping it against the work surface to remove any bubbles and help the raspberries rise up from the bottom. Bake in the preheated oven for 35 minutes until set on the edges but wobbling slightly in the middle.
Once cooked, remove from the tin, running knife around the edges to loosen if necessary, and serve.

Answer 1

The raspberries should work if you strain them thoroughly and fold them in very carefully so they don't break apart. Adding the liquid to the cheesecake will noticeably alter the texture, probably making it mushy; note that there aren't any water based ingredients in the recipe which you could substitute raspberry syrup for. I wouldn't recommend it. If you wanted to add raspberry flavor to a cheesecake, your best bet would be a raspberry pastry flavoring oil. If you didn't want to waste that liquid (and why would you,) just drizzle it on top of each slice as you serve it.

Answer 2

I recommend cooking down and really reducing the berry juice you want to use into a thick syrup so that there's less moisture being added to the base if you really want the color + flavor (cool completely before adding to the base). If adding this to the cheesecake base for one uniform berry cheesecake base, I'd recommend to borrow the sugar you use in the syrup from the total sugar the recipe is calling for.

Alternatively, cook down your frozen raspberries with some sugar, pinch of salt and lemon zest and use as a topping, or cook this even further into more of a compote (even with the berry juice if using) and either use as a topping or incorporated in. At this point you could combine this reduction with some of the plain cheesecake batter and create a berry and plain marble swirl if you like. Personally, I'd go for the berry compote atop a plain or lemon zest cheesecake base.

Regardless, using the berry juice OR the frozen raspberries, you need to reduce the moisture content from either or both before adding it in. Otherwise, your cheesecake will take longer to bake and could affect the final texture in an unpleasant way. Take into consideration the % of sugar you will be adding in as well.

Best of luck!