When cream cheese goes on sale at the Teeter, I can’t help but buy four blocks. Why four? Four is the necessary amount blocks to make a big, honkin’, at least 10-pound cheesecake.
For me, a good cheesecake is defined by a crushed cookie or cracker crust, a creamy baked middle, and THICK tall slices – no puny slices allowed. And none of that no-bake stuff either. If you are gonna make cheesecake, might as well go big or go home.
Cheesecakes are finicky things. One of the challenges of making a cheesecake is getting a smooth top. In the baking and cooling process, cheesecakes tend to split down the middle like the Grand Canyon, leaving it to you to come up with a creative idea to hide the crack. Also, it tough to achieve a creamy silky cake – sometimes they come out thick and dry. Some recipes require water baths, leaving the cake sitting in the oven for hours, sour cream topping, pre-baking the crust, etc. Blech, who has time for that?
Well, here is a simple, straight-forward recipe that yields a tall, creamy cake that comes out crack-free.
This plain vanilla cheesecake has a gingersnap crust and a blueberry lemon topping. Strangely, it’s the easiest cheesecake recipe I’ve made and the results are the best yet. For a more traditional cake, feel free to substitute in graham crackers for the crust or to use canned cherry topping.
Perfect New York Cheesecake
Ingredients:
2 cups crushed gingersnap cookies
2 tablespoons butter, melted
4 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese (room temperature)
1 1/2 cups white sugar
3/4 cup milk
4 eggs
1 cup sour cream
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 9 inch springform pan.
2. In a medium bowl, mix cookie crumbs with melted butter. Press onto bottom and sides of springform pan. (Tip: Use the bottom of a glass to press and flatten the crumbs in tight.)
3. In a large bowl, mix cream cheese with sugar until smooth. (Tip: I use the paddle attachment on my Kitchen-Aid, not the wire beater. Also, don’t mix too furiously. Beating in too much air contributes to collapsing, cracking, and a ruins the dense texture you are trying to achieve.) Blend in milk, and then mix in the eggs one at a time, mixing just enough to incorporate. Mix in sour cream, vanilla and flour until smooth. Pour filling into prepared crust.
4. Bake in preheated oven for 1 hour. Turn the oven off, and let cake cool in oven with the door closed for 1 to 2 hours; this prevents cracking. Chill in refrigerator until serving. Top with blueberry topping if desired.
Blueberry Lemon Topping
1 1/2 cups frozen blueberries
1/4 sugar
1/2 cup water
1 tablespoon cornstarch dissolved in a few tablespoons cold water
Boil blueberries, sugar and water until blueberries soften. Add in enough of the cornstarch mixture to thicken topping to desired consistency.
This article appears in Dec 15-21, 2009.
