CheeseCake Catastrophe



Hello Friends,

So a few weeks ago, I was watching the Create channel and Martha Stewart Bakes.  I was never really a fan of Martha's...but I do have to say her cooking shows I find very intriguing.  Anyway - She was making all sorts of cheesecakes... Ricotta Cheesecake and NY Style Cheesecake and even one with a fruit Jelly kind of thing. 

I was curious about her NY cheesecake as her recipe called for some flour.  Any cheesecake I've ever made didn't have any flour in it... and hers looked so good...

Martha Stewart's NY Style Cheesecake

I decided to make it!  Now, I'm sure I've said in the past... but I'm a terrible baker.  I hardly bake anything because it is too precise for me when I'm a 'handful of this' kind of a girl. So even though I've decided to bake this cheesecake...it took me about three weeks to work up the gumption to actually do it. 

So...here is the recipe...

Ingredients:
12 Graham Crackers
6 tablespoons of melted butter
2 tablespoons of sugar
a pinch of salt

7  eight ounce packages of Cream Cheese - room temperature
2 1/4 cups of sugar
1/2 cup of flour
1 cup of room temperature sour cream
1 1/2 teaspoons of vanilla
5 large eggs, room temperature

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Take a bit of extra butter and butter your spring form pan and then wrap the pan with aluminum foil (this goes in a water bath to cook, so this will protect the cake from getting water in it).

Put into your food processor the graham crackers, melted butter, salt and sugar...process until a fine crumb.  Press the crumb into the bottom of the pan and compact it down.  Put the pan into the freezer for 15 minutes to set.  Then bake the crust for 15 minutes until golden.  Let it cool.

Beat the cream cheese for about 3 to 4 minutes to combine it and make it creamy.  In a separate bowl, whisk together the sugar and flour.  Slowly add a bit of the dry mixture into the bowl and a bit of the sour cream and then let it beat for about a minute.  Repeat until all the dry mix and the sour cream is incorporated.  Add in the vanilla...and then one at a time add the eggs.

Take the mixture and pour it into the cooled pan.  Place that pan into a large roasting pan and fill with hot water so it goes up half the side of the cake pan. Place the cake into the oven and bake for 45 minutes.  Then - reduce the oven temperature to 325 and bake for an additional 30 minutes.  After the 30 minutes are up...shut off the oven but leave the cheesecake inside for one hour.  Remove and let cool.

This is what mine looked like when finished:

Not as pretty as Martha's ... but a good first time effort!

I cut a piece and I will have to say - it was delicious!!  Very moist and creamy, very light and fluffy.  I really do recommend making this cheesecake.  I was so excited - and looked forward to sharing it with Dave and even bring some to my brothers house as they all love cheesecake.

This is what happens when you don't take the bottom of the spring form pan off the cake and then try to wrap it up to put it into the fridge:

Splat

Catastrophe.

'Nuff Said.

Until Next Time...

EAT