Archive for: Cakes – Cheesecake
While I do enjoy a good slice of cheesecake, I prefer to make cheesecake bars at home when I’m looking for a cheesecake fix. They’re easy to make, have a short baking time and don’t need to be baked in a water bath. They also make a great basic recipe for putting all kinds of variations on for different flavors. For this batch, I wanted to add a key lime element to my cheesecake bars and get the richness of cheesecake and the tang of a key lime pie in one dessert.
Most of the flavor comes from a homemade key lime curd that is swirled into the cheesecake batter before baking. This curd is a twist on a lower fat lemon curd recipe that I absolutely love. Made with tart key lime juice, the curd is very bright and citrusy. It makes for a nice contrast with the rich tasting cream cheese filling. I simply added a few dollops of the curd into the cheesecake and lightly swirled it around with a butter knife before baking. In some places where there was more curd than others, the lime curd sank below the cheesecake (other places it remained lightly swirled on top), creating a nice layered effect. The whole dessert is much less sweet than key lime pie, with a wonderfully rich cheesecake texture and a very refreshing lime flavor. If you don’t have key limes, you can use regular limes in the recipe for lime curd.
The bars have a vanilla crumb crust that is made with crushed vanilla wafer cookies and butter, and is baked and cooled before being filled with cheesecake mixture. Graham crackers would work for the crust, as well, but the vanilla adds a nice mellow flavor that goes very well with the flavor of the cream cheese. The crust holds up very well to the filling without getting soggy, and while it would be crumbly if you tried to slice it on its own, the filling adds the perfect amount of moisture to keep it together and still slice easily.
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New York Style Cheesecake is known for being rich, creamy, heavy and indulgent. And when I say “heavy” I mean it literally, because the classic recipe for this type of cheesecake calls for 2 1/2 lbs of cream cheese! The dense but smooth texture of the cheesecake is its signature, setting it apart from other types of cheesecakes and making it so popular – and rather high in fat from all that cream cheese. Having a slice once in a while is a real treat and not one to miss, but a lighter version of this classic recipe, like the Authentic New York Cheesecake developed by America’s Test Kitchen from The America’s Test Kitchen Healthy Family Cookbook means that you can indulge a little more often.
This cheesecake looks and tastes just like the real thing. It is dense and creamy, with a wonderful cream cheese flavor backed up by a hint of lemon zest and a bit of vanilla extract. It feels very decadent when you take that first bite, so you might be a bit surprised to hear what goes into this cheesecake. It uses light cream cheese – with only a fraction of the fat of regular cream cheese – as well as low fat cottage cheese and low fat yogurt cheese. The trick to using the cottage cheese is draining it. Getting rid of that excess moisture allows it to blend very smoothly in with the rest of the ingredients in this cake. You will need a food processor to make this cheesecake, as it is essential to getting the texture of the filling down pat.
The yogurt cheese is also an unusual ingredient. Some stores sell yogurt cheese already packaged (it is also called labne), but you can simply use thick Greek-style yogurt and drain it along with the cream cheese for a similar result if your store doesn’t carry the labne. America’s Test Kitchen recommends draining plain, non-Greek yogurt for 10 hours to make your own yogurt cheese, but it is a lot quicker to start with the thicker Greek yogurt, which is easy to find in just about any grocery store.
The other trick to this cheesecake is the baking method. Some cheesecakes call for the use of a water bath, which allows heat to hit the pan at a very consistent temperature. This cheesecake is baked briefly at a very high temperature to set it, then baked for a long time at an extremely low temperature, which allows the custard to cook gently even without the aid of a water bath. Your cheesecake shouldn’t crack during baking with this method, although I will confess that mine cracked during cooling because my kitchen was very cold and the big temperature change caused the cheesecake to cool too quickly (and therefore crack).
This cheesecake is delicious plain or topped with fresh berries. It keeps well, covered in the refrigerator, for at least two days after baking, too.
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Sometimes, red velvet cakes are known more for their brilliant coloring than they are for their flavor because it is easier to simply make the cake look fancy than put together a great recipe. Flavor is unquestionably the most important thing for a baked good to have, but it sure doesn’t hurt to have a “wow” factor on top of that. These Red Velvet Cheesecake Brownies definitely have an impressive look and a delicious combination of flavors to back it up.
Red velvet cake usually has a hint of both cocoa and buttermilk flavors to it and gets most of its color from the addition of red food coloring. For these brownies, I opted to leave out the buttermilk to keep a fudgy, brownie-like texture and add just enough food coloring to give these normally chocolate-colored brownies a deep red hue. The brownie batter is made with dark chocolate and you definitely get a much bigger chocolate hit from these than you might from a slice of red velvet cake. That said, the chocolate flavor is less intense than it is for some other brownie recipes – for instance, I usually add cocoa powder into my brownies as well – so you still get a little lightness to that chocolate flavor in a nod to the cake. The brownie itself is very fudgy and tender.
Red velvet cake is also usually topped off with a cream cheese frosting. It adds a contrasting color to the deep red cake and a lot of flavor. That cream cheese frosting appears here has a cream cheese swirl that is baked right into a cheesecake layer right on top of the brownie batter. The cheesecake is creamy and rich tasting, a great contrast to the brownie base. Take the time to swirl the cream cheese mixture into the brownie batter with a butter knife, rather than just simply pouring it on top, to get the best look from your finished brownies.
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One way to combine cheesecake and brownies is in a batch of cheesecake brownies. It’s a fantastic combination of rich cream cheese and decadent chocolate that is also very portable and easy to enjoy. But it’s not the only way to enjoy this combination of ingredients. I put them together in the form of a cheesecake with a brownie base, delivering more brownie and more cheesecake in each bite – and giving you a dessert with a real wow factor on top o it.
This dessert is put together in two parts. First, the brownie base is baked in a springform pan, then a no-baked cheesecake batter is poured on top of it. I like the no-bake cheesecake for this recipe because it has a slightly lighter texture than some cheesecakes, which really highlights the difference between the creamy cheesecake and the dense brownies. The cheesecake still has that luscious, smooth texture to it that you would expect from a cheesecake, it just has a hint of airiness that helps it melt on the tongue and contrast with the chewy brownies.
You can prepare this whole dessert in advance, as it needs time to chill and allow the cheesecake to set up before serving. The cheesecake only needs a couple of hours in the fridge to set up, but you can easily prepare this the night before you want to serve it so you don’t have to do any last minute preparation. For a unique twist, if you want something a little different that just a classic vanilla and chocolate combination, add in a teaspoon of mint extract along with the melted chocolate in the cheesecake batter for a mint chocolate marble dessert!
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Ever since I got back from judging the Crisco 2010 National Pie Championships, I’ve been getting requests for recipes for Lemon Swirl Cream Cheese Pie, the pie that took home the best in show prize. The American Pie Council has posted the recipe on their site, but I couldn’t resist making it myself at home.
The pie is basically a cheesecake, with a cream cheese and egg-based custard filling in a pie crust. There are a couple of things that set it apart, however. The first is that there is a lot of lemon curd in the cheesecake filling, and there are swirls of lemon curd on top of the pie. The lemon curd is homemade with fresh lemon juice, so it packs a lot of lemon flavor. The second thing is the vanilla wafer and almond crust, which is crisp and substantial enough to hold up to the filling. The pie is easy to make, although you do need to make the lemon curd about 30 minutes ahead of time. As you would expect, the pie is also delicious and has a great combination of bright lemon and rich cream cheese flavors in a smooth, creamy base.
The presentation of the winning pie was better than mine is here. Not only did it have piped on whipping cream around the border of the pie, it was also garnished with fresh raspberries and thin lemon slices. Since mine isn’t going into a contest (just my stomach, more than likely!), I dispensed with some of the garnish. The only other note I’ll make about this pie is that the original recipe called for adding lemon extract into the filling. I felt that it really distracted me, since the pie is already packed full of flavorful lemon curd and definitely doesn’t need an artificial flavoring to improve on it in any way.
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