Lemon Cheesecake Squares (for Passover!)

How would you rate these cheesecake squares for Passover originality? 

Who knew that Kraft even made a kosher for Passover line of Philadelphia cream cheese?  I happened to stumble upon these two packages at the grocery store the other day and found the idea for this recipe inside the package. With a little twist of my own, it appeared at my second seder for dessert!

First, I combined a little cake meal, matzo meal, sugar and margarine for the crust and pressed it into an 8x8 square dish.

Then, I followed the cheesecake recipe from the inside of the box, poured it over the crust and baked it in the oven for 25 minutes.

Shhhh...Don't tell anyone...it was so easy!

And so delicious!

Try it!

Passover Lemon Cheesecake Squares

(Adapted from the Philadelphia recipe)

Makes 16 Servings

For the Crust

2/3 cup cake meal

2/3 cup matzo meal

1/4 cup sugar

4 Tbsp. melted margarine 

For the Cheesecake

2 pkg. (8 oz. each) Philadelphia Cream Cheese softened
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp. zest and 1 Tbsp. juice from one lemon
1/2 tsp. Passover vanilla
2 eggs (room temperature)

MAKE IT
Heat oven to 350.  In a small pot, melt margarine at medium-low heat. Remove pot from burner and add cake meal, matzo meal and sugar.  Mix together until combined. Press onto bottom 8-inch square pan sprayed with cooking spray.

Beat cream cheese, sugar, lemon zest, juice and vanilla in a large bowl with mixer until well blended. Add eggs, 1 at a time, mixing after each just until blended. Pour over crust. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes until center is almost set.  Cool completely. Refrigerate for 3 hours.

Enjoy!

Mini Cherry Cheesecakes

The perfect sized dessert to satisfy any cheesecake craving!

I had been meaning to make mini cheesecakes for quite some time now. However, I haven't really had a purpose. Since Rich and I were invited out to celebrate our friends Clare and Mark's birthday over the weekend, and I had also invited some friends over for brunch the next day, this ended up being the perfect opportunity. Such a simple recipe, and so delicious!

Initially, I was looking through my Meal Leani Yumm! cookbook and wanted to make low fat mini cheesecakes, but I realized that I did not have cottage cheese at home. :( So of course, I did what any Bakerella follower would do, and searched for cheesecake recipes on her blog. BINGO! Here you have it...a modified version of her Super Easy Mini Cherry Cheesecakes!

Here are the ingredients you will need.  The baking cups aren't part of the ingredients, of course, but they are such a key item that I included them in the shot!  The only missing item is the cherry pie filling.

I bought these 2-inch mini baking cups at Wegmans in the United States.  The great thing about them is that they stand alone on a cookie sheet.  No need for muffin tins!   

I filled each tin with 1/2 tablespoon of graham cookie crumbs and used the flat side of a rolling pin to flatten the crumbs to form the crust of the mini cheesecakes. Bake for 5 minutes at 350 degrees. See below for the complete recipe.

After the crust has cooled to room temperature and the batter is ready, spoon about 3 tablespoons of batter into each tin. Bake and let cool completely before garnishing.

Garnish with cherries from canned cherry pie filling. 

Remove wrapper carefully to view the layers of goodness...

Take a bite!

Bet you can't each just one!

Wrap and refrigerate remaining mini cheesecakes until ready to serve! 

ENJOY!

Mini Cherry Cheesecakes

For the crust:

1 1/4 graham cookie crumbs

1/4 cup of margarine

3 tsp. sugar

In a small pot, melt margarine at medium-low heat. Remove pot from burner and add graham cookie crumbs and sugar.  Mix together until combined.  Spoon 1/2 tablespoon of crumbs into 2″ aluminum mini baking cups. Flatten crumbs to form crust of mini cheesecake.  Bake at 350 degrees for five minutes and let cool. 

For the filling:

2 pkg. (8oz.) cream cheese, softened to room temperature

3/4 cup sugar
3 eggs
1 tbsp vanilla
1 tbsp fresh squeezed lemon juice

Cherry pie filling

In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, mix the cream cheese and sugar until smooth, scraping down the sides frequently. Add eggs one at a time and mix. Finally, add vanilla and lemon juice, and mix until just blended. Spoon 3 tablespoons of batter into each tin. Bake at 350 degrees for 15 to 20 minutes. Once cheesecakes have cooled completely, garnish with cherries from canned cherry pie filling.  Refrigerate until ready to serve.

Yield: About 30 mini cheesecakes.

Cheesecake

Happy New Year!

What a perfect opportunity to try out a new recipe using the gift I received from my Secret Santa! Thanks Mary! 

In fact, I didn't use the exact recipe found on page 60 of Sweet Cakes 2009 from Fine Cooking Magazine.  I modified it from a Triple Chocolate Cheesecake to a New York Style Cheesecake.  Silly me....only now as I am referring back through the magazine did I notice two other recipes for regular cheesecake! 

This was the first time I used sour cream when making cheesecake.  It makes for a much creamier cake.  Very delicious if I may say so myself! 

Ingredients you will need: (Modified from Fine Cooking Holiday Baking Issue)

For the Crust

1 1/2 cups graham cookie crumbs

3 tbsp. granulated sugar

4 tbsp. unsalted butter melted

For the Filling

1/2 cup sour cream

2 tsp. vanilla extract

3 8oz. packages cream cheese at room temperature

1/4 tsp. table salt

1 1/4 cups granulated sugar

3 large eggs, at room temperature

Make the Crust

Heat oven to 400 degrees.  In a medium bowl, stir together the graham cracker crumbs and sugar until blended.  Drizzle with melted butter and mix until well blended and the crumbs are evenly moist.  Dump the mixture into a 9 inch spring form pan and press evenly onto the bottom and about 1 inch up the sides of the pan. (I used a coffee mug to push the mixture against the walls of the pan.) Bake for 10 minutes and set on a wire rack to cool.  Reduce oven temperature to 300 degrees. 

Mix the Filling and Bake

Mix the sour cream and vanilla in a small bowl and let set. In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the cream cheese and salt until very smooth and fluffy, scraping down the sides of the bowl and paddle frequently.  Add the sugar and continue beating until well blended and smooth. 

Beat in the sour cream mixture until well blended.  Add the eggs, one at a time, and beat until just blended.  Don't overbeat, or the cheesecake will puff up too much. Pour the filling over the cooled crust, spread evenly and smooth the top. 

Bake at 300 degrees until the center barely jiggles when nudged, about 50-60 minutes.  Let cool to room temperature and then refrigerate until well chilled, at least a few hours or overnight for the best texture and flavour.  To serve, unclasp the pan's ring, remove it and run a long thin metal spatula under the bottom crust.  Carefully slide the cake onto a flat serving plate.  Garnish with whip cream and berries.

Bring to a friend's for New Years or for any occasion!

Enjoy every last bite!

Happy New Year!

Cheesecake Pops

Soon after I began my blog, my cousin Naomi challenged me to make Cheesecake Pops! I knew that my grandmother's 96th birthday would be the perfect occasion to attempt this challenge! Although these delicious mouthfuls were quite time consuming to make, they were certainly worth it! A definite crowd pleaser! (Thanks again Bakerella!)

I used a basic cheesecake recipe to make a cheesecake (minus the crust) and let it sit in the fridge overnight. Using a mini ice cream scooper that I bought at Target last week, I scooped the cheesecake into even sized balls.

I was able to scoop out just over 30 balls in total and lined them up on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet.


I filled a bowl with Oreo Cookie crumbs. I rolled about 5 balls in the crumbs at a time to cover the surface of each one. This helped shape some of the balls into rounder balls, and also added the "crust like" part of the cheesecake to the cheesecake pop! I could have used graham crumbs instead, but this is what I had handy!



Finally, I arranged them onto the cookie sheet and placed them in the freezer for about 20 minutes as I prepared all of the remaining ingredients.

I bought milk chocolate wafers from Bulk Barn. They are round chocolate disks about the size of a quarter that melt very easily. I melted them in the microwave for 30 seconds at a time until the consistency was perfect! I then dipped and coated one ball at a time into the ooey gooey melted chocolate! I put a stick into each one, and they were ready to be decorated!

I didn't have any sprinkles to decorate on hand. Therefore, as finely as I could, I chopped up a box of Smarties and a Hershey's Cookies and Cream chocolate bar. I either sprinkled some of the candy onto the pop, or dipped the pop into the mixture to add some extras to it! I really liked the color that the smarties added!

Tada!!!

They really are a bite of heaven! Just enough for a perfect sized dessert!