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Remains of a burned cheesecake

A friend of mine's wife was baking a cheesecake, which she does somewhat regularly. The house filled up with smoke, and when they opened the oven, they observed that it had caught fire. Apparently it was a fairly standard cheesecake, not a unique petrol-flavored version, nor even spiked with a healthy dose of brandy. She proceeded to remake the same recipe immediately after with no further conflagration.

I did a bit of googling and the only conjecture I saw that somewhat jibes with the circular burn mark is that somehow liquid fat separated from the filling, pooled, and caught fire.

Any idea why specifically that would happen, or alternative explanations?

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Michael Natkin
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    Whoa. There's not any evidence to suggest the oven for some reason got too hot, is there? (Oven malfunction or user error?) I'm pretty sure most food fats have combustion points well above normal cheesecake baking temperatures. – Cascabel Feb 07 '12 at 22:49
  • That's not true - butter burns at 250 F for example. – Michael Natkin Feb 07 '12 at 23:19
  • Hm, true, but isn't that because of all the other things in it? I figured we could be confident that the combustion point of homogenous cheesecake batter is below its baking temperature, so either something did separate, or the oven was too hot. – Cascabel Feb 07 '12 at 23:28
  • I can't tell from the picture—did she forget to fill the water bath? – derobert Feb 07 '12 at 23:56
  • (not that I think failing to fill the water bath would set it ablaze, I'm guessing @Sean Hart's "broiler"—by user error or oven malfunction—is the answer) – derobert Feb 08 '12 at 00:33
  • @Jefromi - right, thus the conjecture that liquid fat *separated* from the homogenous batter. – Michael Natkin Feb 08 '12 at 00:35
  • @derobert yes, the water is there. – Michael Natkin Feb 08 '12 at 00:36
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    Is it bad that I was disappointed there wasn't a video...:) – Jay Feb 08 '12 at 00:38
  • Well, butter burns at 250°F, but that's the milk solids. Clarified butter is much higher, above 350°F (i.e., hotter than the oven should have been). So if the fats separated out, you'd have clarified butter, which wouldn't smoke, much less ignite. (And, also, should it happen again, probably best to turn off the oven and let the fire go out before opening the door. The oven is designed to contain fire. Opening the door ads oxygen.) – derobert Feb 08 '12 at 00:41
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    @derobert Correct, yes, I meant the butter as an example. I'm wondering if some fraction separated that contained something flammable below 350. I think the shape of the pool somewhat suggests that. I wouldn't expect a round shape from any broiler setup I'm familiar with. Of course I guess it could be both. If the broiler was on, that high temp might cause separation into a round puddle followed by ignition. – Michael Natkin Feb 08 '12 at 00:47
  • Not sure if the oven has that, but here in germany, many ovens have a "grill" function (not sure how it is called in english) where basically some piece of metal at the top starts to glow. I could imagine that this function could cause something like this. – Flo Feb 08 '12 at 08:50

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I know it sounds like a stupid question, but are you sure the oven wasn't in "broil" or "clean" mode? It seems unlikely that a regular shape of flammable would emerge from a fairly homogeneous mixture. It seems more likely that a heat source in the shape of the burn marks on the top of the cheesecake was radiating directly onto it. It could have been an intermittent malfunction with the oven, too.

Other than that, I'm lost. It's quite a mystery you have on your hands there.

Sean Hart
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