TWD Rewind: Dorie's Revenge Exacting Cheesecake

Once a week, my boyfriend Jack and I get together with a few friends of ours who live in our building.  We will usually rotate cooking duties, with Chelsea and Chris (and their adorable 16 month old son, Kip, who is the smartest 16 month old child I have ever met) cooking one week and Jack and I cooking the next.  The first time, we cooked the entree and Chelsea brought with them the best chocolate mousse in the world. I'm serious. It is one of those head exploding into your brain type desserts.  And the best (worst for my diet) thing was that they left the leftovers with us!  As I am the queen of just having "bites" or only eating half of a cookie and saving the other half for the next day, I would often rise at 5:30 am and get ready to go to the gym. On my way out, I would have a spoonful of mousse.  At 5:30 in the morning. On my way to the gym.

It was so worth it.

As revenge (ok not really!), I decided to bake up Dorie's Cheesecake (click for recipe) for our next week's dinner.  I missed out when the group made this cheesecake, as I was off eating pork cracklings and gaining weight in Puerto Rico, but I heard that this cake was the cheesecake of all cheesecakes. 

I often decide that it is a good idea to start baking cheesecakes at 10 at night, realizing about an hour later that it takes about 7 hours for a cheesecake to be completely cooked and cooled before I can actually cover it and put it in the refrigerator. It never fails. So I set my alarm (twice, once to take the cake out of the oven after it's 2 + hours of cooking/resting in the oven, and then again at around 4 am to put the cake in the fridge). 

It was so worth it. The crust was thick and crunchy, and I added some cinnamon to give it some extra spice.  The cheesecake was soft, sweet, tangy and creamy and I will definitely be making this again.

I decided that I wanted to top it with something seasonal, so I decided to mix another of Dorie's recipes that I missed while I was often plumping and tanning in PR - the French Pear Tart, chosen by Dorie herself.  I poached the pears, diced them and served them on the side with this caramel sauce (which, I have discovered, is the caramel sauce to end all caramel sauces. This will forever be my go-to caramel recipe. It is what caramel should be - rich and creamy, with a deeply complex flavor). 

Chelsea and Chris loved it. And as revenge, I left it there for them to eat all week!

A HA!

OK, but I really think that I was the one that lost out. 

Sigh.

Comments

[pinkstripes]

Your cheesecake looks perfect. I can't believe you started at 10 pm and got up throughout the night. wow. That caramel sauce sounds delicious. I'll have to check it out.