My husband loves cheesecake. I mean, it's almost an intimate relationship between him and the cheesecake when he sits down to have a piece. And...being a New Yorker, clearly he prefers the New York Style Cheesecake, not the Jell-o brand that whips up in 5 minutes. So...being the "always aiming to please" wife that I am, I learned how to make a New York Style Cheesecake. I have went through about 6 different recipes to perfect what I now call "My Cheesecake", because each recipe yielded something different, but had a unique quality that we liked and desired. The baking time and temperature has been the hardest tweek, and quite frankly...given a different oven, would need to be tweeked again. It's such a trial and error process with me and cooking. I like to make things easy and quickly, so I always try to find shortcuts around every recipe. This is the one recipe I can't find a shortcut around. You just can't make this quickly. Don't try....it won't happen. It requires prep time and planning time. It also requires you to make it the day before you actually need it. It is a huge pain in the butt recipe and even a little costly. With that being said, it is so worth it. It's so rewarding when you pull out your perfect, golden, stand a fork up in it cheesecake, that holds all the flavor, sweetness and creaminess of the city that we all love, The Big Apple. Each time I make it and we take that first bite, things get quiet. It takes us back to that deli in Manhattan, where each piece is the size of my face and you can't help but eat the whole, wonderful thing. So anyway...here is the recipe. This is OUR favorite, but may not be yours. We don't like the lemon in ours, nor do we like the crustless kind. To each, their own. Enjoy!
You will need....
Spring form pan
Aluminum foil
Another pan that the spring form pan will fit into
And a stand up mixer
1 1/4 cups of graham cracker crumbs....however you want to go about getting them. I use the crumbs in the box, it just makes life easier.
1/3 cup of melted butter
4-8 oz.containers of cream cheese (room temperature)(I use the 1/3 less fat just to try and make this even a little bit less horrible for me)
4-eggs (room temperature)
8 oz. or 1 cup of sour cream (room temperature)(I've learned to use the real thing here, not the light....it makes a difference)
1 1/3 cups of sugar
3/4 cup of milk (room temperature)
1/4 cup of self-rising flour
1 TBSP of vanilla extract
Preheat oven to 450F.
Grease your spring form pan or spray with a non-stick cooking spray.
Mix your butter and graham cracker crumbs together and press into the bottom of your pan.
Wrap your pan in aluminum foil, making sure to cover the bottom and half-way up the sides.
Mix your ingredients together...add them one by one...cream cheese and sugar first.
Mix until creamy and little to no lumps and pour into your prepared pan.
Place spring form pan into the other pan and pour water into the larger pan creating a "bain marie" which literally is like a bath for your cheesecake. This helps it rise and keep it from sticking.
Bake at 450 for about ten minutes.
Then lower the temperature to 200F and bake for two hours.
Then raise the oven back up to about 325 to 350 and bake for another 30 minutes.
You will have to keep an eye on it more at this point, because it will rise considerably and brown quickly.
DO NOT OPEN THE OVEN WHILE ITS BAKING! I can't promise you no cracks in your cheesecake (because it depends on your oven, your products, and your humidity), but I can promise you it will crack if you keep opening up the oven to check or adjust your cheesecake. And I don't mean a small little crack on the side, I mean a grand canyon across your entire cheesecake that you cannot fix.
Once you are happy with the color and it doesn't jiggle to much when you walk across the floor in front of the oven (haha), go ahead and shut off the oven and prop open the oven door for about 2 hours.
Then sit on the counter for about another 2 hours to finish cooling.
Then wrap with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator overnight.
It's so good with anything you want to put on it(strawberries, blackberries, raspberries), but why mess with perfection?
ENJOY!
No comments:
Post a Comment