Hello everyone,

I’m sure everyone is busy planning for the holiday season; Christmas parties , battling traffic, staying warm, decorating trees, Christmas shopping survival strategies, and of course bountiful festive meals. I’m here to help with that last one.

You see this beautiful cake I made in this wonderful picture I took? After days of painstaking trial and error, I finally got this recipe just right. I slaved over the oven for hours and hours as I crafted this cheesecake masterpiece for my beloved family, and my culinary genius became apparent to all. They fawned over both my inner and outer beauty as they feasted on the fruits of my labour, then all agreed how impressive of a baker and human being I am, and unanimously elected me their benevolent overlord.

Ok I lied. I totally lied. I had NOTHING to do with this recipe, apart from the fact that I helped eat it and it was awesome. The part about the fawning and benevolent leader stuff is a lie too. The recipe is by some lady named Diane on food.com and my dear friend Micheline was the one who slaved over the oven to bring this magnificent cheesecake to a family gathering.

It really is a win-win for me … a post in which I didn’t do any actual cooking and a crazy good cheese cake I got to help eat!

After having a piece of this cheesecake, I decided it would be a hit at any holiday party, so thought I would share it with you in case you need some help with dessert planning for an upcoming festive gathering.

CHEESECAKE 101

1. Use room temperature ingredients
2. Mix well until ingredients have just combined and are smooth, do not over-mix: air bubbles cause cracks!
3. Always use a spring-form pan
4. Be sure to evenly grease your spring-form pan
5. Leave the cake in the oven with the door open for an hour after baking
6. Remember to chill 6-8 hours before serving
7. For this particular cheesecake, decorate with whipped cream right before serving, or whipped cream will fall flat.

 

Click here for the original post by Rose Bakes

Special thanks to Micheline (who possesses both great inner and outer beauty) for finding the recipe, making the cheesecake, taking the pictures, and sharing this great dessert experience with me. All I did was write a couple of paragraphs and put my name on the whole thing!

Sometimes, the fox lucks out and gets to eat whatever it is the little red hen is baking.

Your Benevolent Overlord,

Julie

Click here for the printable MS Word version of recipe:
eggnog-cheesecake-with-gingersnap-crust

_____________________________________________

Eggnog Cheesecake with Gingersnap Crust
By Diane

Total Time: 2 hrs 30 minutes

INGREDIENTS:

For the Crust

12 ounces gingersnaps, crushed to fine crumbs
¼ cup sugar
¼ tsp cinnamon
6 tbsp salted butter, melted

For the Filling

32 ounces cream cheese, softened to room temperature
4 large eggs, at room temperature
1 ½ cups eggnog
1 ¼ cup granulated sugar
3 tbsp all purpose flour
1 tsp rum extract
1 tsp cinnamon

DIRECTIONS:

1. Start by preheating your oven to 325°F and then making the crust. I used my blender to crush the gingersnaps, then poured them into a bowl and added the sugar, cinnamon and melted butter. Mix it all up until the crust is all soaked with butter!Pour the crushed cookies into a 10″ spring-form pan and up the sides at least an inch.
2. in a large mixing bowl, beat the cream cheese until very light and fluffy. Then add the eggs, one at a time, mixing after each addition and scraping down the sides as needed.
3. Next you’ll need to add in the eggnog and mix until smooth. After that, add the sugar, flour, and cinnamon. And yes… mix again until smooth and creamy.
4. Pour mixture into your crust and bake it for 1 hour, then turn the oven off and crack the oven door. Leave the cheesecake there for another hour. After that, you can move it to a cooling rack to come to room temp or cover it and move it directly to the fridge.
5. Cool and chill for 6-8 hours before serving.