Well when I bought that spring form pan a few weeks ago I only had one thing in mind… MAKE CHEESECAKE! My sister Tiffani shared a recipe with me that she has adapted for cheesecake and she swears by it. I have not made a cheesecake since I helped my mom in like middle school! She must have been making it for mine or Tiffani’s birthday because we both always picked cheesecake for our birthday cake! Any-who it was perfect timing when she called me with that recipe because I had been craving some cheesecake and so was Jason!!

New York Style Cheesecake

• 4 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese
• 1 3/4 cups white sugar
• 3/4 cup milk
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1 vanilla bean (save the pod for later)
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

For the crust

• 2 plastic pouches of graham crackers
• Anywhere from half a stick to a whole stick of butter
• 3 tablespoons vanilla sugar (you can use regular white sugar)

First things first… as you will see through my mishaps here that… well my sister forgot to tell me that this is really enough for two cheesecakes or 1 cake and then cupcakes! I should have noticed by the measurements being on the larger side but I was just thinking “Well Tiff didn’t say that” and thought maybe it was just going to work out. Now I see that in the future I will have other options but this is more then enough crust and filling for one 9″ pan.

OK so to get started pre-heat your oven to 350. Then you want to butter and flour your spring form pan and set it aside. In a medium bowl, mix graham cracker crumbs with melted butter. Press onto bottom of spring form pan.

I wanted a nice fine crumb and Jason had just bought the Ninja so I thought it was a good time to test it out. So I put mine in there and then….

TADA! now just dump them in a bowl and add the butter. The butter is not an exact science you just add melted butter until you are happy with the texture. I like it just wet enough that when pinched it will hold it’s shape. Once you have the crust as wet as you prefer it press it down into your spring form pan. I used the bottom of a glass to press it in there nice and tight.

In a large bowl, mix cream cheese with sugar until smooth. Stir in milk, and then mix in the eggs one at a time, mixing just enough to incorporate. Mix in sour cream, vanilla extract and bean and flour until smooth. Pour filling into prepared crust.

They say the trick to a good cheesecake that does not crack and is the right texture is making sure you DO NOT OVER MIX the batter. Once you beat together the cream cheese and sugar (until light and fluffy) you do not even need to use a mixer you can do it by hand just until everything is incorporated…

If you have never used a vanilla bean then you want to bend it a little in your hand and then slice down the pod from end to end but not cutting all the way through.

Then with the back side of a butter knife you want to scrap the insides of the pod and get all the beans out. See below. I placed all the beans I got out of the pod on the mixer paddle so you could see it. The brown down below in the batter is the extract.

Once you have incorporated everything being very careful to NOT OVER MIX!!!! You can pour your batter on the crust…

Can you see all those black flecks… those are the vanilla beans… YUM!! Now I can tell you right now you should test the batter. If you had a situation like me I was trying to snap pictures while baking and I already am always a mess but I really had it all over my hands. I tried it and oh my word! You knew at that moment how good this cake was going to be!

Now here is where the light bulb should have gone on for me! LOOK how full this pan is… I kept thinking well maybe cheesecake doesn’t rise? I could not remember…and against my gut instinct I filled the pan this full!!! I then had a hard time banging it on the counter to get the air bubbles out but you need to do that and only fill it 3/4 full!

Save the extra batter and I will show you what you can do with it! It will keep in the fridge for up to a week I think, but I just used mine later that night. And remember you will have more then I do here since you will be smart and not over fill your pan! Because you are a genius!

Make sure you let it cool in the oven with the door closed. It will keep cooking but it will also let it naturally cool instead of going into shock from the oven to the fridge which can cause cracking!!

I had to cook mine too long because the pan was so dang full. Even though it browned like this it still tasted great!

Now with the extra I went ahead and line a cupcake pan with liners… Spray the liners with non stick spray so they are easier to eat later.

I put a heaping tablespoon of crust in each liner and pressed down with a measuring glass…

Then I put about 2 to 2.5 scoops from the “big spoon” in our silverware set. I guess that is close to the size of a tablespoon maybe slightly bigger… Now you can fill them as much as you like. I had paranoia about them rising but because they are on such a smaller scale that did not happen…

See those air bubbles… You need to be sure to bang the pan on the counter but picking it up slightly and dropping it to get all of the bubbles out of the batter and to the top or those bubbles will come out in the form of cracks… if your cups are not too full then you will have no spills and they will look like this….

That hole in the middle cupcake is where I checked it for done-ness (is that a word? It is now!!) The cupcakes were done after about 20 minutes, but be sure you check them incase yours are thicker. I sure hope you guys make this recipe! I think it is kind of great that you get enough for a cake and then a batch or two of cupcakes depending on how thick you make them… it would be great for a party when sometimes you need just a little bit more! Plus who could resist these cute little buggers? NOT anyone who is cool that’s who!

 

Look at that! I think that is the perfect crust to cake ratio! The crust is my favorite!

Go make this and tell me what you think… and learn from my mistakes friends! Cheesecakes do rise… and you should always trust your instincts!!