Munchie Mondays: Cindy's Citrus Berry Cheesecake

Remember that night I was craving cheesecake? Well, here's it is!



Frankly, I've never baked one before, but it came out pretty good. I'm darn proud of my cheesecake, yes sirree! At first I thought it might have been too "wet" but ended up setting up nicely in the fridge after it cooled down. I'm assuming that the amount of actual cream cheese can be varied some if you want something a little lighter.

I will say that this cake was incredibly labor intensive and I doubt I'm going to make another one any time soon. However, I suppose it's worth the effort. It is kind of important to either have a cake leveler or be adept at leveling a cake with a sharp knife if you want this to look pretty. I actually didn't know cheese cake came out of the over with a "skin" but that makes perfect sense. The ones you get at a store or buy at a bakery are all prettified. With that said, you do lose a lot of cake when you do that! A friend of mine suggested dumping the scrapings into a vat of home ice cream. Not a bad idea. :)

Cindy's Citrus Berry Cheesecake

crust:
1 cup chocolate graham cracker crumbs (plain works too)
3/4 cup chopped pecans or almonds
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup butter, melted

filling:
4 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
1 (14z) can of condensed milk
4 eggs
juice of one lemon
juice of one lime
1 tsp lemon rind
1 tsp lime rind
1 tsp orange rind

topping:
1/4 c of dark chocolate chips
whipped cream (1/2 cup yielded enough for my topping)
fresh berries (I used raspberries)

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F



In a bowl combine cookie crumbs with sugar and melted butter. Mix thoroughly until crumbs are moistened. Dump into a 9 or 9/5 inch spring form pan and press crumbs down firmly and evenly to the bottom of the pan:



In another bowl beat cream cheese until fluffy. Add the rest of the ingredients and beat on high or medium speed until well incorporated. Pour into pan.

Place pan atop cookie sheet in case batter spills. Bake for 50 to 55 minutes or until cake is set. You can test this by poking the center with a toothpick.

When done, let it cool inside of the pan for 5 minutes. Run a sharp knife around the perimeter of the pan and release cake. Cool a top a wire rack for an additional 10 minutes. Meanwhile, if you so desire, level the cake with a cake lever or sharp knife to remove crust:





Place cheesecake (lightly covered with plastic wrap) in refrigerator and let cool for at least 4 hours. I let my cool and set up overnight. The cake with become much more dense when it settles.

Prior to decorating, wash and dry berries. Melt chocolate chips in a Ziploc baggie by placing bag with chocolate in a vat of hot water. Beat heavy cream on high with a pinch of sugar and vanilla to make whipped cream (or just go to the store and buy some...doesn't matter to me).

To decorate, snip the end of the ziplock bag and draw designs on top of the cake. You can do whatever you want. You could even skip this step, but the chocolate goes well with the tanginess of the citrus and berry flavors. Some people like to do chocolate shavings instead.



Top with whipped cream and fresh berries and you're good to go! Voila!



Pretty eh? Don't forget to put this back in the fridge after serving lest you get food poisoning or fuzzy mold on your berries. That was the hard lesson I learned. T, my mom and I each only got to eat one slice before I left the thing sitting on the counter.

Munchie Mondays: Anise Lemon Thyme Sables

This recipe came about during a rant session one day when Sammi and I hanging out. Cookies just seemed to be in order and I realized I had a bottle of pure anise extract that just *had* to be used somehow.

I love the smell and taste of liquorice, but my husband nearly gags when he gets a whiff of it, so needless to say it's been a long time since I've made any sort of anise cookie. As a weird side note, I learned off of wikipedia that anise extract can be added to fishing bait to lure fish. Considering T doesn't like fish either, maybe there's a connection? I have no idea.

Anyway, when I was pondering what type of cookie to make (Oatmeal peanut butter being the 2nd choice), Miss S squealed with "Ooooooh anise!" So yeah, this recipe was born in my kitchen from a happy discovery that someone else actually like anise and that I could finally bake cookies using this pungent recipe again. It's adapted from a low-fat recipe for crunchy anise cinnamon crips. You know how I feel about anything low-fat (evil, I say!), so I adulterated and modified it a good bit and thus came my new favorite cookie.

Anise Lemon Thyme Sables
about 30 cookies

2 cups of flour
1/2 tsp of baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup of shortening
1/3 cup of butter softened
3/4 cup of sugar
1 large egg
one egg yolk
1 1/2 tsp of anise extract (seeds can be used as well)
1 tsp grated lemon zest
1 tsp grated lime zest
1/2 tsp of dried thyme

1 tbs of Turbinado/raw sugar for decoration (optional)

Oven temperature is 375 degrees Fahrenheit

In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder, salt and thyme until well mixed. Set aside.

Cream the softened butter and shortening with the sugar. Add eggs, anise extract and zest. Beat until fluffy. Slowly mix in the flour to form a stiff by pliable dough.

Gather the dough and form a log atop a piece of wax paper and roll up, twisting the ends so that dough doesn't escape. I like to shape mine into a triangle so that it doesn't roll away but it doesn't matter. In fact, I suspect these would be fine as drop cookies and baked straight away. However, I like making my sables as either sliced or cut out cookies.

Anyway, put into freeze for 30 minutes or until dough firms up. Meanwhile heat oven.

When firm, slice into 1/4 pieces using a sharp knife.


Since these are sliced cookies, they shouldn't spread much (if they do, next time you make the dough, add 1/8th to a 1/4 cup of flour and see if it fixes it). Arrange fairly close together on a cookie sheet.



If you like, sprinkle raw sugar on top prior to baking (Sammi helped out with this section because it was too dang hard to photograph myself while sprinkling sugar at the same time).



Bake for roughly 10-12 minutes or until edges turn golden brown. Baking time will depend on how thin the cookies were sliced and also the dough temperature. I think we baked this batch for 12 minutes. When done, immediately remove from cookie sheet and allow to cool in a rack.




Using a mixer could probably make a lighter cookie. I hand mixed these and they still came out scrumptious---soft delicate crumb with a crunchy exterior that melts in your mouth. The thyme, lemon and anise all compliment each other and no one flavor is predominant. They smell divine too, of course. I think I finished off 6 of them in one sitting.



They go fabulous with milk or tea and good conversation.