White Chocolate Raspberry Cheesecake

I went to a Christmas Potluck with a few friends and obviously I volunteered to bring dessert :)

After going through a few recipes, I decided to go with a white chocolate raspberry cheesecake off of Allrecipes.com.  Reading through a lot of the comments, I did as many reviewers suggested, baked it in a water bath and doubled the amount of crust.  When I make this again, I think I will just do 1.5 times the recommended amount on the site as the crust to cheesecake ratio was slightly high but double was still yummy.

This cheesecake came together quite quickly, the part that took the most time was making the raspberry sauce and straining out the seeds and even that didn't take that long.

The crust was straightforward, just melted butter, sugar and cookie crumbs.  I opted to crush up chocolate wafers myself over buying the already ground up cookies.  I find that it has a fresher taste, but this may all be in my head :p  After mixing together the crust ingredients, I pressed them into the bottom of a springform pan by hand, trying to make it as packed in as possible.  The crust was made fairly level, but I made it a little higher around the perimeter to make sure that none of the cheesecake filling leaked out of the pan.

I melted the white chocolate chips in the microwave with cream.  I find that its easier to melt the chocolate in the microwave instead of using a double boiler, but it can be done either way

To make sure the raspberry sauce was evenly distributed through the cake, half of the batter was added to the springform pan and a couple of tablespoons of the raspberry sauce were swirled through it.  After adding the rest of the batter, I made a dot in the center and then concentric circles about that on the top of the cake with the sauce.  This was made easier as I put the sauce in a squirt bottle, but it could've also been done with a ziploc bag with a corner cut off.  I took a long skewer and pulled lines out of the center at regular intervals, and then between those, pulled the skewer from the outside toward the center.  (That's how I got the pattern to the right)

I baked the cake in a water bath for a little under an hour, then turned the oven off and let it sit in there until the over was cool.  This helps to cook the cake evenly and prevent cracking.

We ate this the next day after it had chilled for about 24 hours and it released easily from the pan, but I did run a knife around the edge before removing it just in case.

I definitely recommend trying this recipe!

Recipe adapted from allrecipes

Yield: 1 - 10 inch cheesecake 

Crust
2 cups chocolate cookie crumbs
6 tablespoons white sugar
1/2 cup butter, melted

Sauce
10 oz frozen raspberries
2 tablespoons white sugar
2 teaspoons cornstarch
1/2 cup water 

Filling
2 cups white chocolate chips
1/2 cup half-and-half cream
3 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup white sugar
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. In a medium bowl, mix together cookie crumbs, 6 tablespoons sugar, and melted butter. Press mixture into the bottom of a 10 inch springform pan.   
2. In a saucepan, combine raspberries, 2 tablespoons sugar, cornstarch, and water. Bring to boil, and continue boiling 5 minutes, or until sauce is thick. Strain sauce through a mesh strainer to remove seeds.
3. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Microwave white chocolate chips with half-and-half, stirring occasionally until smooth.
4. In a large bowl, mix together cream cheese and 1/2 cup sugar until smooth. Beat in eggs one at a time. Blend in vanilla and melted white chocolate. Pour half of batter over crust. Spoon 3 tablespoons raspberry sauce over batter. Pour remaining cheesecake batter into pan.  Create concentric circles with the sauce on the top.  Using a long skewer, pull in and out of the center to create a pattern.
5. Place springform pan in large roasting pan and fill roasting pan with boiling water to go about an inch up the side.  Bake for 55 to 60 minutes, or until filling is set.  Turn off oven and let cake sit inside until oven is cool.  Cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 8 hours before removing from pan. Serve with remaining raspberry sauce

 

Soft and Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

 

This recipe has become my go to cookie recipe.  Who doesn't like good old fashioned chocolate chip cookies?  They are so comforting and easy to make!

The special ingredient, vanilla pudding mix, keeps the cookies soft and tasting fresh for days.  All the other ingredients are what you would expect; butter, flour, eggs, baking soda, sugar, vanilla and chocolate chips.

The cookie dough comes together really quickly.  I cream the butter and sugar in my standing mixer, add the pudding mix, then eggs and vanilla.  Then hand mix in the flour and chocolate chips.

Using an ice cream scoop, I scoop out equal mounds of dough.  (When these pictures were taken, I wasn't baking in my kitchen, so I improvised with a measuring cup)  I like to use an ice cream scoop or measuring cup as it makes sure all the cookies are an equal size and bake evenly as well.




 I baked them on a parchment sheet for about 8 minutes.  I like to slightly under bake the cookies, so that they have a nice soft chewy center.  I take them out of the oven just before the center looks fully done and leave them on the baking sheet to cool.  They will continue to cook for a bit from the heat of the baking sheet.  I was baking in a convection toaster oven, so it may take longer in a full size oven.

Recipe adapted from allrecipes

Yield: 6 dozen

4 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 

2 teaspoons baking soda

2 cups butter, softened

1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar

1/2 cup white sugar

2 (3.4 ounce) packages instant vanilla pudding mix
4 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
4 cups semisweet chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Sift together the flour and baking soda, set aside.
2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter, brown sugar, and white sugar. Beat in the instant pudding mix until blended. Stir in the eggs and vanilla. Blend in the flour mixture. Finally, stir in the chocolate chips and nuts. Drop cookies by rounded spoonfuls onto parchment paper lined cookie sheets.
3. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven.