Cheesecake!
Sat, Mar. 4th, 2006 07:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
oyceterYay! I have successfullly made cheesecake, despite my penchant for recipe modification!
Chocolate marbled cheesecake bars, made my way
(actually, stolen from the wrapper of a Ghirardelli bar, but what the hey)
Equipment:
8x8 or 9x9 pan
Ingredients:
Crust:
1 c. flour
1 c. pecans, finely chopped (or hazelnuts toasted for 5-10 min. at 350 degrees and then smashed on the counter with a hammer)
1/2 c. butter, softened (I put it next to the toaster oven when I was toasting the hazelnuts)
1/2 c. brown sugar, firmly packed
Batter:
24 oz. cream cheese, softened (or 8 oz. non-fat cream cheese, 8 oz. normal cream cheese and 8 oz. mascarpone left over from other baking sessions)
3/4 c. sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract (or none, because you forgot to buy some and already made two grocery runs and are tired and entirely too absent-minded, damnit)
3 eggs
1/2 bar (2 oz) 60% cocoa bittersweet chocolate, melted (or 3/4 of a bar, because more chocolate is never a bad thing!)
Preheat oven to 325 F.
Crust:
- Combine the flour, nuts, butter, and brown sugar and mix until everything looks somewhat pebbly. If you're like me and opt to use a bowl instead of a food processor because you are too lazy to clean out the food processor, you'll have to cut the butter into itty pieces to combine it better.
- Line pan with parchment paper (for easy clean-up and extraction later) and press mixture onto bottom. Someday, I will remember to butter the bottom so that the parchment paper sticks instead of sliding around, but apparently this was not that time.
- Poke some holes in the crust with a fork (they didn't tell me to do this, but my other crust recipe did, and Alton Brown said it was called docking and it was Of the Good. And! I know that baking the crust ahead of time is called blind baking! I don't know why, but I shower my useless knowledge upon all of you hapless readers!)
- Bake 15-16 minutes, or until light golden brown. Or get confused about the color, because the crust didn't actually change color and was light golden brown to begin with, but trust that it's about done because it smells extremely nutty.
Batter:
- In a large mixing bowl, beat the cream cheese, mascarpone, sugar, and vanilla extract until well blended. Learn to love your hand mixer, which is the newest Best Thing Ever.
- Add the eggs one at a time, beating well. (side note: Originally I didn't realize the recipe called for 24 oz. of cheese, so I was just going to use mascarpone and separate the whites from the yolks, mix in the yolks, then beat the egg whites to the stiff peaks phase and fold it into the mascarpone mixture, just to get a lighter texture. And because I like watching egg whites turn stiff)
- Set 1 c. of plain batter to the side
- Melt chocolate over a double boiler (mine consists of a metal mixing bowl that fits just onto a pot with really hot water. I think you can also melt in the microwave or via direct heat)
- Mix melted chocolate into the batter. Note: do not pour melted chocolate in and then spend ten minutes trying to lick every single bit of melted chocolate out of the double boiler, as the chocolate will harden slightly and leave you with chocolate-flecked batter. On the other hand... totally worth it.
- Spoon chocolate batter over crust
- Pour 1 c. of plain batter set aside earlier into the mixture and swirl with knife. Or, you know, plop it all down and attempt to make swirls, and then just give up when your swirls are just blobby and leave blobs of white everywhere.
- Bake 30-35 minutes, or until center is just set. (I actually didn't have the center set perfectly, because it still cooks a little after you take it out of the oven, and I didn't want the top to crack. If you are a particularly ardent cook and/or fan of Good Eats, you may want to put your entire pan in a water bath, as that apparently stabilizes the heat transmission process and makes your cheesecake much prettier. I, as usual, was too lazy.)
- Cool to room temperature
- Refrigerate for three hours at the very least and constantly fight the urge to just eat the darn thing already.
When serving, heat knife in hot water so that you don't get that nasty gunked-up knife thing. Or, just have a gunked-up knife and eat all the tasty cheesecake gunk while serving ;).
Chocolate marbled cheesecake bars, made my way
(actually, stolen from the wrapper of a Ghirardelli bar, but what the hey)
Equipment:
8x8 or 9x9 pan
Ingredients:
Crust:
1 c. flour
1 c. pecans, finely chopped (or hazelnuts toasted for 5-10 min. at 350 degrees and then smashed on the counter with a hammer)
1/2 c. butter, softened (I put it next to the toaster oven when I was toasting the hazelnuts)
1/2 c. brown sugar, firmly packed
Batter:
24 oz. cream cheese, softened (or 8 oz. non-fat cream cheese, 8 oz. normal cream cheese and 8 oz. mascarpone left over from other baking sessions)
3/4 c. sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract (or none, because you forgot to buy some and already made two grocery runs and are tired and entirely too absent-minded, damnit)
3 eggs
1/2 bar (2 oz) 60% cocoa bittersweet chocolate, melted (or 3/4 of a bar, because more chocolate is never a bad thing!)
Preheat oven to 325 F.
Crust:
- Combine the flour, nuts, butter, and brown sugar and mix until everything looks somewhat pebbly. If you're like me and opt to use a bowl instead of a food processor because you are too lazy to clean out the food processor, you'll have to cut the butter into itty pieces to combine it better.
- Line pan with parchment paper (for easy clean-up and extraction later) and press mixture onto bottom. Someday, I will remember to butter the bottom so that the parchment paper sticks instead of sliding around, but apparently this was not that time.
- Poke some holes in the crust with a fork (they didn't tell me to do this, but my other crust recipe did, and Alton Brown said it was called docking and it was Of the Good. And! I know that baking the crust ahead of time is called blind baking! I don't know why, but I shower my useless knowledge upon all of you hapless readers!)
- Bake 15-16 minutes, or until light golden brown. Or get confused about the color, because the crust didn't actually change color and was light golden brown to begin with, but trust that it's about done because it smells extremely nutty.
Batter:
- In a large mixing bowl, beat the cream cheese, mascarpone, sugar, and vanilla extract until well blended. Learn to love your hand mixer, which is the newest Best Thing Ever.
- Add the eggs one at a time, beating well. (side note: Originally I didn't realize the recipe called for 24 oz. of cheese, so I was just going to use mascarpone and separate the whites from the yolks, mix in the yolks, then beat the egg whites to the stiff peaks phase and fold it into the mascarpone mixture, just to get a lighter texture. And because I like watching egg whites turn stiff)
- Set 1 c. of plain batter to the side
- Melt chocolate over a double boiler (mine consists of a metal mixing bowl that fits just onto a pot with really hot water. I think you can also melt in the microwave or via direct heat)
- Mix melted chocolate into the batter. Note: do not pour melted chocolate in and then spend ten minutes trying to lick every single bit of melted chocolate out of the double boiler, as the chocolate will harden slightly and leave you with chocolate-flecked batter. On the other hand... totally worth it.
- Spoon chocolate batter over crust
- Pour 1 c. of plain batter set aside earlier into the mixture and swirl with knife. Or, you know, plop it all down and attempt to make swirls, and then just give up when your swirls are just blobby and leave blobs of white everywhere.
- Bake 30-35 minutes, or until center is just set. (I actually didn't have the center set perfectly, because it still cooks a little after you take it out of the oven, and I didn't want the top to crack. If you are a particularly ardent cook and/or fan of Good Eats, you may want to put your entire pan in a water bath, as that apparently stabilizes the heat transmission process and makes your cheesecake much prettier. I, as usual, was too lazy.)
- Cool to room temperature
- Refrigerate for three hours at the very least and constantly fight the urge to just eat the darn thing already.
When serving, heat knife in hot water so that you don't get that nasty gunked-up knife thing. Or, just have a gunked-up knife and eat all the tasty cheesecake gunk while serving ;).
Tags:
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Sun, Mar. 5th, 2006 04:01 am (UTC)(no subject)
Sun, Mar. 5th, 2006 07:29 am (UTC)(no subject)
Sun, Mar. 5th, 2006 01:56 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Mon, Mar. 6th, 2006 06:13 pm (UTC)Mmmm, cheesecake.
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Mon, Mar. 6th, 2006 06:14 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Sun, Mar. 12th, 2006 01:13 am (UTC)