April Daring Bakers: Cheesecake

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

This month's challenge was free reign to adapt the following cheesecake recipe.  The base recipe was wonderfully easy and delicious!  It was the perfect cheesecake texture.  I made an orange chocolate cheesecake variation.  Instead of adding vanilla extract or lemon juice, I added 2 T orange juice as well the zest of two oranges.  For the crust, I used Joe Joe's (Trader Joe's "Oreos") since I just used cupcake liners for my cheesecake.  I topped each cheesecake with orange marmalade after it had cooled.  Then, poured chocolate ganache on top of the marmalade.  They were wonderful!*  

Fortunately it was my uncle-in-law's birthday and we were able to pawn most of these cheesecakes off on him, so that helped prevent AIDBG -- Accidental Ingesting of Delicious Baked Goods.  I am a member of AIDBG anon.  

So, if you dare, try the Daring Baker's cheesecake challenge!  It's amazing.  But, if you're trying to lose/maintain your weight, make sure you have plenty of people to take these off your hands first!

Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake:

*crust:

2 cups / 180 g graham cracker crumbs

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
1 tbsp. vanilla extract (or the innards of a vanilla bean)
1 tbsp liqueur, optional, but choose what will work well with your cheesecake

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!

Some variations from the recipe creator:

** Lavender-scented cheesecake w/ blueberries - heat the cup of heavy cream in the microwave or a saucepan until hot but not boiling. Add 2 tbsp of lavender flowers and stir. Let lavender steep in the cream for about 10-15 minutes, then strain the flowers out. Add strained cream to cheesecake batter as normal. Top with fresh blueberries, or make a quick stovetop blueberry sauce (splash of orange juice, blueberries, a little bit of sugar, and a dash of cinnamon - cook until berries burst, then cool)

** Cafe au lait cheesecake with caramel - take 1/4 cup of the heavy cream and heat it in the microwave for a short amount of time until very hot. Add 1-2 tbsp. instant espresso or instant coffee; stir to dissolve. Add this to the remainder of cream and use as normal. Top cheesecake with homemade caramel sauce (I usually find one on the food network website - just make sure it has heavy cream in it. You can use store-bought in a pinch, but the flavor is just not the same since its usually just sugar and corn syrup with no dairy).

** Tropical – add about a half cup of chopped macadamias to the crust, then top the cake with a mango-raspberry-mandarin orange puree.

** Mexican Turtle - add a bar of melted dark chocolate (between 3 and 5 oz., to taste) to the batter, along with a teaspoon of cinnamon and a dash of cayenne pepper (about 1/8 tsp.). Top it with pecan halves and a homemade caramel sauce.

** Honey-cinnamon with port-pomegranate poached pears – replace 1/2 cup of the sugar with 1/2 cup of honey, add about a teaspoon or more (to taste) of cinnamon. Take 2 pears (any variety you like or whatever is in season), peeled and cored, and poach them in a boiling poaching liquid of port wine, pomegranate juice/seeds, a couple of "coins" of fresh ginger, a cinnamon stick, and about a 1/4 cup of sugar. Poach them until tender, then let cool. Strain the poaching liquid and simmer until reduced to a syrupy-glaze consistency, then cool. Thinly slice the cooled pears and fan them out atop the cooled cheesecake. Pour the cooled poaching syrup over the pears, then sprinkle the top with chopped walnuts and fresh pomegranate seeds.

Some variations from Jenny (from JennyBakes):

**Key lime - add zest from one lime to sugar before mixing with cream cheese. Substitute lemon juice, alcohol, and vanilla with key lime juice.

**Cheesecakelets - put in muffin tins, ramekins, or custard cups. Try baking 20-35 minutes, or until still a little jiggly, and cool as before.

Iron Cupcake: Soda

It's that time again . . . I've been out of the Iron Cupcake loop for a while, but hopped back for pop!  Originally I had planned on using pineapple soda for a pina COLAda cupcake, but couldn't find pineapple soda!!  So, plan B became Strawberry Crush soda cupcakes.  I'm very happy with the result, and got rave reviews from both Chris and my coworkers.  If you want to make them yourself, here's the recipe:

For the cake (adapted from Billy's Vanilla, Vanilla Cupcakes):

1 3/4 cups cake flour, not self-rising

1 1/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

2 cups sugar

1 tablespoons baking powder

3/4 teaspoons baking salt

1 cup (2 sticks) butter

4 large eggs

1 cup Strawberry Crush soda

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Line cupcake pans with paper liners; set aside.  In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine flours, sugar, baking powder, and salt; mix on low speed until combined.  Add butter, mixing until just coated with flour.

2.  In a large glass measuring cup, whisk together eggs, strawberry soda, and vanilla.  With mixer on medium speed, add wet ingredients in 3 parts, scraping down sides of bowl before each addition; beat until ingredients are incorporated but do not overbeat.

3.  Divide batter evenly among liners filling about 2/3 full.  Baking, rotating pan halfway through, until a cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean, 17-20 minutes.

For the frosting:

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter

1/2 cup vegetable shortening

3-4 cups powdered sugar (depending on the consistency you desire)

1 T heavy cream

1/8 cup Strawberry Crush soda

1/4 cup chopped fresh strawberry

1/4 cup crushed pineapple with juice (I used fresh pineapple)

1.  Beat butter and shortening in a mixer until fluffy and combined.

2.  Add cream and continue beating.

3.  Add powdered sugar, alternating with strawberry soda for moisture.

4.  Stir or mix in fresh strawberries and crushed pineapple.

Topping:

coconut

sprinkles

On a side note: As I write this blog post I'm listening to New Kids on the Block on seeqpod and loving every minute of it!  Is that something I shouldn't be telling you all?  Or, are NKOTB cool again?  Or, do I really even care what you think about me listening to NKOTB?  No.

Trip to Jay International Food -- always an adventure!

My loot from Jay International Foods.

Vermiccelli noodles to make some sort of delicious stir-fry . . . 

Quinoa, which I have been looking for, and have never tried using before.  Anyone have good quinoa recipes?

The chocolate-almond nougat bar that was tasty, and only 138 calories for 1/2 a bar!

After our recent delicious kabob and turkey burger cook-out meal, I am psyched to use this kabob seasoning.

Mmmmmmmm. . . wafer cookies in exotic flavors!

Today, after lunch at Lemongrass with the parents, brother, and grandparents, we took an impromptu trip across the street to Jay's International.  I got the above treasures.  I have been looking for Quinoa for a while at the regular grocery store, and wasn't able to find it, so I was happy to find it at Jay's.  I've always loved wafer cookies (I'm not sure why), and they had all kinds of unique flavors such as: coconut, mango, pineapple, and guava!  I chose the most unusual.  The candy bar I got was pretty good too, it almost tasted like a nutty power bar.  I can't wait to use the kabob spices!  We had friends over last night, and our friend Katie brought over deliciously marinated chicken and veggie kabobs.  Katie's friend Brea brought the most scrumptious turkey burgers I have ever had!  I wish I had taken pictures.  Her turkey burgers had feta incorporated into the meat -- wunderbar!

Pizza on the grill!

Heck, I'll grill anything if the weather's nice!  And tonight (this post is a few days later) I was craving pizza, but just had to grill since it was finally a lovely day.  So, I brainstormed, and realized that we had some whole wheat naan bread that I just bought at Trader Joe's as well as some eggplant/red pepper spread from TJ's.  So, without much more thought, dinner was brought to fruition.  And here are the lovely results.

I have to give some props here; you may have noticed that I changed my blog name, lightened things up a bit.  Well, this is a result of a fortuitous stumble upon a blog called Kath Eats Real Food.  Click it, I dare you, you'll come back from cyber space a healthier person!  Due to her inspirational story and realistic eating habits, I was able to make some real changes to my eating habits.  I joined Calorie King, which has really helped me portion control, well . . . most of the time.  I have been working out at the Y much more often than I was, but still not enough.  After I fell down the stairs earlier this week and really messed up my knee, I haven't been going.  As soon as this bruise clears up, though, it's on!  I have been able to run on the treadmill for 1.5 miles, which may sound like nothing to some, but for me that's a lot.  Especially with my exercise-induced asthma issues.

If you want to make these delicious grilled naan pizzas, it's as simple as:

1. Place naan and your choice of veggies on grill (we used yellow bell peppers and onions).

2. Top grilled naan with Red Pepper Spread.

3.  Top with vegetables and fresh mozzarella cheese.

4.  Place under broiler until cheese melts.

5.  Eat!  Only around 370 calories for one pizza

My favorite food quote:

This came out of the mouth of one of my 1st grade students with Autism who LOVES food:

"The grocery store is a glorious place!"

I can't agree more!

Goodbye, Sugar!

Well, not really, at least not completely.  I really need to make a lifestyle change, which includes scaling back on the baking.  I love to bake, but I also love to eat what I bake.  I just can't resist my products.  Sometimes, I manage to bring what I bake to work and shove off the calories on coworkers, but often I consume a significant amount before that even happens.  Plus, I just don't have money to give away tons of baked goods.  So, I think for a while, I am going to be limiting my baking to healthier baked goods, and The Daring Bakers.  I am going to have to take a break from TWD, as you may have already noticed.  So, to start off my lightened up version of my blog, try out this recipe, it's amazing!  We've been whittling it away for the past 4 breakfasts.  It's a great breakfast along with a piece of fruit or yogurt!

Daring Bakers -- Flourless Chocolate Cake

The February 2009 challenge is hosted by Wendy of WMPE's blog and Dharm of Dad ~ Baker & Chef.  We have chosen a Chocolate Valentino cake by Chef Wan; a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Dharm and a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Wendy as the challenge.

This was a great challenge, seeing as though I had always wanted to make and try a flourless chocolate cake!  It was actually very easy to make, and turned out well.  My husband LOVED it, because he's the chocolate freak.  I liked it, but preferred the ice cream that I made, which was amazing!  Instead of using the suggested ice cream recipes I went with a salted caramel ice cream.  I have been on a salted caramel kick for a while.  Especially since Europe, when I came across the cutest salted caramels in Paris.  The ice cream turned out to be a strange color in the photograph, but in real-life, the color is more subtle.  I think next time I try this recipe, I might try baking the cakes in a deeper container, to see what that does to the texture.  Check out the recipe and try some for yourself!  

Chocolate Valentino

Preparation Time: 20 minutes

16 ounces (1 pound) of semisweet chocolate, roughly chopped

1/2 cup (1 stick) plus 2 tablespoons of unsalted butter

5 large eggs, separated

1.  Put chocolate and butter in a heat proof bowl and set over a pan of simmering water (the bottom of the bowl should not touch the water) and melt, stirring often.

2.  While your chocolate butter mixture is cooling, butter your pan and line with a parchment circle then butter the parchment.

3.  Separate the egg yolks from the egg whites and put into two medium/large bowls.

4.  Whip the egg whites in a medium/large grease-free bowl until stiff peaks are formed (do not over-whip or the cake will be dry).

5.  With the same beater, beat the egg yolks together.

6.  Add the egg yolks to the cooled chocolate.

7.  Fold in 1/3 of the egg whites into the chocolate mixture and follow with the remaining 2/3.  Fold until no whites remain without deflating the batter.

8.  Pour batter into prepared pan, the batter should fill the pan 3/4 of the way full, and bake at 375F

9.  Bake for 25 minutes until an instant read thermometer reads 140F

Note-- if you do not have an instant read thermometer, the top of the cake will look similar to a brownie and a cake tester will appear wet.

10.  Cool cake on a rack for 10 minutes, then unmold.

Salted Butter Caramel Ice Cream

From David Lebovitz

One generous quart (liter)

For the caramel praline (mix-in)

1/2 cup sugar

3/4 teaspoon sea salt, such as fleur de sel

For the ice cream custard

2 cups whole milk, divided

1 1/2 cups sugar

4 tablespoons salted butter

scant 1/2 teaspoon sea salt

1 cup heavy cream

5 large egg yolks

3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

1.  To make the caramel praline, spread the 1/2 cup of sugar in an even layer in a medium-sized, unlined heavy duty saucepan:  I use a 6 quart/liter pan.  Line a baking sheet with a silicone baking mat or brush it sparingly with unflavored oil.  (I just used parchment paper)

2.  Heat the sugar over moderate heat until the edges begin to melt.  Use a heatproof utensil to gently stir the liquefied sugar from the bottom and edges toward the center, stirring until all the sugar is dissolved (or most of it -- there may be some lumps, which will melt later).  Continue to cook stirring infrequently until the caramel starts smoking and begins to smell like it's just about to burn.  It won't take long.

3.  Without hesitation, sprinkle in the 3/4 teaspoon salt without stirring (don't even pause to scratch your nose), then pour the caramel onto the prepared baking sheet and lift up the baking sheet immediately, tilting and swirling it almost vertically to encourage the caramel to form as thin a layer as possible.  Set aside to harden and cool.

4.  To make the ice cream, make an ice bath by filling a large bowl about a third full with ice cubes and adding a cup or so of water so they're floating.  Nest a smaller bowl (at least 2 quarts) over the ice, pour 1 cup of the milk into the inner bowl, and rest a mesh strainer on top of it.

5.  Spread 1 1/2 cups sugar in the saucepan in an even layer.  Cook over moderate heat, until caramelized, using the same method described in step # 2.

6.  Once caramelized, remove from heat and stir in the butter and salt, until butter is melted, then gradually whisk in the cream, stirring as you go.  The caramel may harden and seize, but return it to the heat and continue to stir over low heat until any hard caramel is melted.  Stir in 1 cup of the milk.

7.  Whisk the yolks in a small bowl and gradually pour some of the warm caramel mixture over the yolks, stirring constantly.  Scrape the warmed yolks back into the saucepan and cook the custard using a heatproof utensil, stirring constantly (scraping the bottom as you stir) until the mixture thickens.  If using an instant-read thermometer, it should read 160-170F.

8.  Pour the custard through the strainer into the milk, set over the ice bath, add the vanilla, then stir frequently until the mixture is cooled down.  Refrigerate for at least 8 hours or until thoroughly chilled.

9.  Freeze the mixture in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's instructions.

10.  While the ice cream is churning, crumble the hardened caramel praline into very little bits, about the size of very large confetti (about 1/2-inch, or 1 cm).  I use a mortar and pestle, although you can make your own kind of music using your hands or a rolling pin.

11.  Once your caramel ice cream is churned, quickly stir in the crushed caramel, then chill in the freezer until firm.

Note: As the ice cream sits, the little bits of caramel may liquefy and get runny and gooey, which is what they're intended to do.