Cherry Cheesecake with Cinnamon-Almond Crust

My dear, dear “Grammy Green”  was the “Cheesecake Queen” and I thank my lucky stars daily that she let me hang out in the kitchen with her all the time! She was patient enough to teach me all her cooking and baking secrets. While my Grammy Green would have made a graham wafer crust, I now use an almond flour crust since being diagnosed as “gluten intolerant”.

I found a wonderful almond crust recipe  from Erica over at Comfy Belly . Please note that  I tweaked Erica’s recipe by  adding a tbsp of cinnamon and not adding the optional cocoa powder.

Almond Flour Crust by Erica of Comfy Belly

• 1 1/2 cups of almond flour (finely ground and blanched)
• 4 tablespoons of butter
• 1/4 teaspoon of almond extract (optional)
• 1/4 cup of honey
• 1 tbsp of cinnamon ( my personal tweak)
• optional- 1/2 tsp of cocoa powder

You’ll want to preheat the oven to 350 degrees and bake the crust for ~ 10 minutes in a spring form pan.

While the crust is cooling in the spring form pan, turn your oven down to 325 degrees and let’s get started on the Grammy G’s basic cheesecake recipe.

On a side note, I just had to share my “very happy orange” measuring spoon set that I got from my BFF, Mrs E. Aren’t these awesome?! I love the fact that they are so bright that they don’t get lost in the baking drawer. Genius I tell ya!

Okay, here are the “stars” in the Grammy G’s basic cheesecake recipe:

• 3 – 8oz packages of Philadelphia Cream Cheese , softened
  
• 3/4 cup of sugar
• 1/2 cup plain yogurt or sour cream
  
• 1 tbsp vanilla
• 3 eggs at room temperature
  

I pull out my Kitchen Aid Mixer to whip this up. When I was in university, I burned out more than one set of electric beaters because I didn’t own a Kitchen Aid Mixer!  So, don’t say you haven’t been warned!!

First,  I beat the softened cream cheese, then add the sugar, sour cream or yogurt and vanilla. TIP: Do NOT over beat or you’ll add extra air and your cheesecake will drop in the middle when it cools! I scrape down the sides and then add the eggs one at a time so it is silky smooth by the time I’m done. I’ll place this mixture into a spring form pan where I’ve already got a crust made and cooled. I bake my cheesecake at 325 degrees for  ~45 minutes or until the center is almost set.

TIPS to  “preventing embarrassing crack issues”: I’ve only had my cheesecake “crack”  a handful of times so I’ll share what I do. I’ve found baking it at a lower temp (325 vs 350 degrees), having a bit of a jiggly center (the cheesecake will continue to bake after it is removed from the oven),  placing the cheesecake on a wire rack and covering with a bowl will let it cool down slowly (the large temperature difference can be a culprit) will prevent cracking. Some folks will “steam” it by placing a pan of water in the oven whilst baking to prevent cracking. I’ve never tried it so if you have any expertise here feel free to chime in ( or if you have any other “just say no to crack” tips please share those too).

I let it cool as described above  for ~ 10 minutes and then run a knife or spatula between the cheesecake and the pan to separate the cheesecake from the pan (an also prevent further cracking). Once the cheesecake has completely cooled, I’ll  place in the refrigerator for at least 8 hours prior to serving. That is the fabulous thing about cheesecakes is you can bake them ahead of time when entertaining (I usually do mine the day before) and pull it out of the fridge right before serving with the topping.

What I love about this basic recipe is the infinite ways that you can alter it to wow your taste buds! If you believe chocolate is a food group like me, you can melt dark chocolate (Dagoba is my favorite) with an 1/2 cup of  heavy whipping cream and “swirl” it into the above mixture after it is in the spring form pan. It looks like one of those fancy restaurant cheesecakes and is absolutely heaven in your mouth! Not a fan of  dark chocolate? Add Kahlua or the liqueur of your choice, melted white chocolate and heaving whipping cream to the base mix and you’ll become known as a Cheesecake King or Queen yourself! Not a fan of chocolate at all? Add 1/4 cup of any  fresh citrus juice (lemon, orange or lime)  to the basic cheesecake recipe for a “fresh and light” tasting cheesecake. Or how about pumpkin cheesecake by adding a can of pureed pumpkin and pumpkin spice? See what I mean, the sky is the limit!

Topping options: They are endless but some of my personal favorites are fresh fruit, chocolate ganache or fresh whipping cream spiked with a little Amaretto. But today, I’m going to make a cherry topping using the recipe off my favorite canned fruit, Oregon.

Cherry Topping

• 1 can of Oregon Red N Tart cherries, drained, reserve juice
• 1/2-3/4 cup sugar (adjust to your “tart or sweet” taste buds).
• 2 tbsps cornstarch ( I use Argo because it is Gluten Free).
• 1/2 tsp almond extract (optional)

Heat the reserved juice, sugar and cornstarch over medium heat until it has thicken to your liking. Remove from heat and add cherries.

Ok, now here is the hard part…..waiting 8-24 hours to dig in. But it is so worth it…..yum!

Sew Crafty Holiday

With the kiddos out of school since last Friday, we’ve been “sew” crafty and gearing up for the holidays. I finally found the time to work on some wool felt ornaments that I purchased as a kit from Plum Creek Collectibles whilst in Houston for the Fall quilt festival. Tammy De Young, the owner, was such a sweet gal and she’s from Texas too. Her designs were just so adorable that I bought two wool felt pattern/kits.

My daughter and I also dug out our paints, brushes & glitter to work on clay , metal and glass holiday ornaments. A little hot chocolate and whole bunch of cookies later, we were like our own little ornament factory!

Phew, yep we were busy……but I did find time to bake myself another of my favorite treats from Living Without-gluten free cranberry scones. Yummy!! And of course, I had to give my Pfaff a little holiday loving too. I created this little “Jingle” table topper that was inspired by a post on Moda Bakeshop by Melissa Mortenson of Polkadot Chair. I just love the Figgy Pudding line by Basic Grey for Moda and will cherish this little table topper for years to come ! So, thank you Melissa for being so generous with your creativity!!

I also made myself a little Christmas present…..the Swing Bag by Amy Butler. Isn’t it darling?  I didn’t use Amy Butler fabrics (sorry Amy) because I fell in love with this line Picadilly by Pamela Mostek for Clothworks. The cool thing is this bag is reversible and I can take the scarf off and wear it too! Sweet or what! And don’t look to closely at my fabric bursting out of my hutch!

I Heart Semi-homemade Gluten Free Pumpkin Muffins

I’m still experimenting with gluten free baking and some recipes have worked better than others. While I prefer to bake things from scratch, I do take the easy route every now and then and use mixes  and go the semi-homemade route.

I made these delicious pumpkin muffins a few weeks ago and just haven’t gotten around to posting my semi-homemade recipe using Betty Crocker’s gluten free yellow cake mix. I have tried several gluten free mixes out there and the $6-8+ price tag always made me pause before placing them in my cart but Betty Crocker is quite reasonable coming in at under $4 in our area.

Semi-homemade Pumpkin Muffins (gluten free)

1 box Gluten Free Betty Crocker yellow cake mix

1/4 cup water

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 tbsp pumpkin spice (add more or less depending on your taste buds)

2 tsps pure vanilla

1 can of pumpkin puree

3 eggs

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

2. I just added all the ingredients in my Kitchen-aid mixer bowl and mixed it for ~ 2 minutes ( I had to stop and scrape down the bowl twice).

3. I placed cupcake liners in my muffin tin and added batter until the liners were ~ 2/3 full.

4. My muffins took about 18 minutes to bake. Your oven may take a little less or more time so make sure you take that into account!

5. Let them cool.

6. Cream cheese icing is optional.

These lasted about 2-3 days and tasted just as good as the day they were made (they were super moist!).  I was wise enough to freeze a few and have enjoyed them with my morning coffee. Yummo!!

BitterSweet-chocolate that is!

One of my favorite food groups is chocolate (and yes, I know it’s really NOT a food group but in my house it is!).  I’ve fallen in love with baking again thanks to folks like Shauna over at Gluten-Free Girl. Whilst browsing through her recipes for a sinful desert to serve to my girl friends, I knew I had scored when I came across this Flourless Chocolate Torte recipe. I mean what was not to love about this decadent desert ….chocolate, eggs, butter & sugar. Yum, life doesn’t taste better than this!

The recipe calls for 10 oz of bittersweet chocolate. Shauna recommends Dagoba and so do I because it is D-i-v-i-n-e. In fact, I have their lavender chocolate bar as my screen saver ( I swear it’s true!) and their drinking chocolate is a weekly Sunday night indulgence for me. However, I ended up using Callebaut because the local Market Street was out of Dagoba. Just make sure you use a good quality chocolate so you’re not disappointed!

Ok, this is what a pound of chocolate looks like. I purchased extra so I could shave chocolate on the top of the torte when I served it with whipped cream and fresh raspberries.

This is what 10 oz of chopped chocolate looks like before it’s melted and baked into this sinfully decadent chocolate torte!

I have to warn you that this torte is super rich and small slices go a long way. Would you believe that a group of 10 ladies was unable to devour this? Me neither! I was forced to eat a slice for breakfast!

Drooling yet? Stop on over at Gluten-Free Girl and say hi to Shauna when you pinch her fabulous recipe!

Sweet-Cherry & Coconut Iced Cake

Almost a year ago, I learned that I was gluten intolerant. In case you’re wondering, it means that my body reacts (and not in a good way) to the protein found in wheat & 7 other grains. I have always loved to baked and scoured the Internet on how to bake EDIBLE gluten free goods! Baking with the alternative flours has been a bit of a challenge but not every experiment has been a disaster.

While I prefer bake from scratch, as a busy wife, mom & business owner, I need to hit the easy button sometimes. I was absolutely tickled to find Gluten Free mixes by non other than Betty Crocker. I did a little happy dance in the aisle of the grocery store right before I snatched up the yellow cake mix.

I’ve been craving a little cake so I whipped this up the other night and it was fabulous for semi-homemade! I made a butter icing from drab to fab with a little maraschino cherry juice, coconut flakes and a few chopped maraschino cherries just right in the center. Doesn’t it look good enough to eat?

So, thanks Betty Crocker, you just made this busy  gluten free Diva very happy!