Monday, April 27, 2009

April Daring Bakers: Cheesecake my way



The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge.

This challenge was more than just making a simple cheesecake though. We were
challenged to take this basic cheesecake and make it our own variety. My inspiration came from a Martini recipe from one of my favorite cream liquor brands
Vanilla Royale. The Martini is called French Kiss and is made with Vanilla Royale, Cream de Cacao and Vodka.

So to the basic recipe I omitted the Lemon juice, added twice the liqour (Vanilla Royale) melted 4oz of Ghirardelli dark chocolate with a tbsp of butter and about a tbsp and a half of Creame de Cacao and added the mix to the batter, and used
Chocolate Teddy Grahmns for the crust. It turnned out absolutely wonderful. The mini cheesecakes (made in muffin tins or muffin cups) were perfect size for a tasty dessert and surprisingly was very light in taste rather than the typical richness of a cheesecake.

Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake:

crust:
2 cups / 180 g graham cracker crumbs (Chocolate Teddy Graham's)
1 stick / 4 oz butter, melted
2 tbsp. / 24 g sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract

cheesecake:
3 sticks of cream cheese, 8 oz each (total of 24 oz) room temperature
1 cup / 210 g sugar
3 large eggs
1 cup / 8 oz heavy cream
1 tbsp. lemon juice (Vanilla Royale)
1 tbsp. vanilla extract (or the innards of a vanilla bean)
1 tbsp liqueur, optional, but choose what will work well with your cheesecake (Vanilla Royale)


4oz Melted Dark Chocolate

1tbsp butter

1-2 tbsp Creme de Cacao

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (Gas Mark 4 = 180C = Moderate heat). Begin to boil a large pot of water for the water bath.

2. Mix together the crust ingredients and press into your preferred pan. You can press the crust just into the bottom, or up the sides of the pan too - baker's choice. Set crust aside.

3. Combine cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of a stand-mixer (or in a large bowl if using a hand-mixer) and cream together until smooth. Add eggs, one at a time, fully incorporating each before adding the next. Make sure to scrape down the bowl in between each egg. Add heavy cream, vanilla, lemon juice, and alcohol and blend until smooth and creamy.

4. Pour batter into prepared crust and tap the pan on the counter a few times to bring all air bubbles to the surface. Place pan into a larger pan and pour boiling water into the larger pan until halfway up the side of the cheesecake pan. If cheesecake pan is not airtight, cover bottom securely with foil before adding water.

5. Bake 45 to 55 minutes, until it is almost done - this can be hard to judge, but you're looking for the cake to hold together, but still have a lot of jiggle to it in the center. You don't want it to be completely firm at this stage. Close the oven door, turn the heat off, and let rest in the cooling oven for one hour. This lets the cake finish cooking and cool down gently enough so that it won't crack on the top. After one hour, remove cheesecake from oven and lift carefully out of water bath. Let it finish cooling on the counter, and then cover and put in the fridge to chill. Once fully chilled, it is ready to serve.

Pan note: The creator of this recipe used to use a springform pan, but no matter how well she wrapped the thing in tin foil, water would always seep in and make the crust soggy. Now she uses one of those 1-use foil "casserole" shaped pans from the grocery store. They're 8 or 9 inches wide and really deep, and best of all, water-tight. When it comes time to serve, just cut the foil away.

Prep notes: While the actual making of this cheesecake is a minimal time commitment, it does need to bake for almost an hour, cool in the oven for an hour, and chill overnight before it is served. Please plan accordingly!



8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Great job, love the chocolate twist!

What's Cookin Chicago said...

Looks delicious and a great recipe too!

Anonymous said...

I love the French Kiss cocktail, so I can only imagine how delicious your lovely cheesecake tastes! I also love the use of chocolate Teddy Grahams..great idea!

Unknown said...

Great job...love the mini cakes. Looks wonderful!

Christina said...

Mmmm, teddy grahams :) Lovely cheesecakes!

ice tea: sugar high said...

You can never go wrong with chocolate I say.. Just out of curiosity, have you ever tried other chocolate brand? how's Ghirardelli holding compared to other brand? I'm in the middle of a quest for the best chocolate to use for baking. I've used Lindt couverture, Valhorna, Callebaut and Belcolade. Never tried Ghirardelli before..

Debyi said...

Your cheesecake sounds divine! The French Kiss cocktail sounds yummy, I've never heard of it before, but will be trying it soon! Great job on your mini cheesecakes!

Unknown said...

mmm! these look great!