Cheesecake Chronicles

It's pretty hard to make cheesecake taste bad. With ingredients like cream cheese, sugar, graham crackers, some question the baking part, grab a spoon and shoot for the bowl instead.

But more often than not, we find ourselves eating mediocre cheesecake. The reason for its mediocrity is most often the texture of the cake. Too dry, and you find yourself nudging bits of cake from the roof of your mouth; too soft, you feel like you're eating cream cheese pudding. 
Cheesecake, if done right, should be a very balanced dessert in every sense of the word. Tangy, sweet, smooth with a slight resistance from its graham cracker crust - it should be a culmination of contrasts that just work well together. 

Now if the cheesecake recipe below could afford to be any more decadent than it already is, it would have to be escorted out of the room. So I decided substitute half of the cream cheese for neufchatel cheese. Neufchatel has about 1/3 less fat than regular cream cheese, and honestly, after a series of taste tests I really couldn't detect a significant difference. So why not?! Plus, it has a higher moisture content than cream cheese which makes the texture of this cake nothing less than awesome.

Beyond Ultimate Cheesecake
(yield: 10-12 servings)

4 tbsp butter, melted

2 cups graham cracker crumbs (14 crackers)

2, 8 oz pkg cream cheese, room temperature
2, 8 oz pkg neufchatel cheese, room temperature

1 1/4 cups sugar

4 eggs

1 cup sour cream

1 tbsp almond liquor

1 oz bittersweet chocolate, roughly chopped

Grease a 9" spring-form pan with 1 tbsp of butter. Combine remaining 3 tbsp of butter with graham cracker crumbs. Reserve 3 tbsp of graham cracker mixture for topping, and press remaining portion into pan. Bake at 325°F for 10-12 minutes. Let cool to room temperature.

Combine cream cheese and neufchatel cheese with sugar. Using an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat until completely softened. Add eggs, one at a time, and continue to mix. Add sour cream and almond liquor. Mix until completely smooth. Pour mixture into the cooled graham cracker crust.

Reduce oven temperature to 325°F.
Wrap pan with two or three layers of aluminum foil to completely cover any cracks. Place into a large roasting pan and fill with boiling water to reach halfway up the sides of the spring form pan. Bake 1 hour and 15 minutes. Turn oven off and let cake cool inside for another hour.

 Place chocolate into a microwave-safe bowl. Microwave for about 1 minute, mixing every 15 seconds, until chocolate is melted. Using a spoon, drizzle the melted chocolate over the top of the cheesecake, and sprinkle with reserved graham cracker crumbs. Refrigerate for at least 4 hours.

Treat Yourself...Right

In search of an indulging treat that you don't have to feel guilty about eating, or giving the kiddies?

Chew on this - a healthy, rich, coconutty, chocolatey cookie made with my new favorite ingredient to cook with - coconut oil.

This oil is INSANELY good for you (among its areas of specialty, skin and hair enhancement, immune health and disease prevention, weight control, yadi yadi yada). And with its butter-like texture, who knew saying "SEE YA!" to our fattening foe would be so easy?


I love things that are good and good for you...feels like I won something :)

Guilt-free Chocolate Coconut Cookies 

(yield: 1 dozen cookies)

1/4 cup unrefined extra-virgin coconut oil

3/4 cup dark brown sugar

1 egg

3/4 cup whole wheat flour

1/4 cup dutch-processed cocoa powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/4 cup bittersweet chocolate, chopped

Non-stick cooking spray

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Spray a large cookie sheet with non-stick cooking spray.

Cream together coconut oil and brown sugar (use an electric mixer if you've got one). Stir in the egg, and mix until smooth. In a separate bowl combine flour, cocoa powder, salt, and baking soda. Add dry mixture to the egg mixture in three increments, mixing just until combined. Stir in the chopped chocolate.

Scoop heaping tablespoonfuls of the batter and roll  into balls. Place on cookie sheet, making sure to leave enough room between each cookie. Bake 10-12 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack or plate and let cool.