Thursday, October 23, 2008

Wendi's Mini Blackbottom Birthday Cheesecakes

Try saying that ten times fast!
So...I've been on quite the baking binge this week. Tomorrow is my co-worker Wendi's birthday, but I'm working at my other job tomorrow. So I decided to bake something and bring it to work with me today. I've never made cheesecake before, which was kind of bothering me. So I decided to give it a shot. I looked through a bunch of yummy looking recipes, but didn't find anything that I really wanted to make. So I did a little brainstorming and came up with these. They were really yummy. The mascarpone insured that they weren't too sweet and the chocolate crust was complimented nicely by the raspberry sauce on top.

This recipe makes about 24 little cakes.

Crust
6-8 oz chocolate graham crackers, crushed
1/2 cup (1 stick) chilled unsalted butter, cubed
mini chocolate chips

Filling
16 oz cream cheese
8 oz mascarpone
3 eggs
3 tbsp flour
3/4 cup sugar (I think I used slightly less)
splash of vanilla

Raspberry Sauce
10 oz frozen raspberries
2 tbsp water
2 tbsp sugar

Here goes...
Heat oven to 350
Prepare muffin tins by adding those silly little paper cups. I kinda hate these things, but it makes getting the cakes out in one piece much easier.
Mix crushed grahams with butter. Do it with your hands the way you would mix pastry dough. Once it's all clumpy and mixed up, press mixture into the bottoms of the prepared muffin tins. Just the bottom, not the sides! Bake these for about five minutes and set aside to cool.
In an electric mixer (or by hand, if you prefer) mix cream cheese, mascarpone, flour, sugar and vanilla until smooth. Add eggs one at a time, beating after each addition.
Sprinkle the mini chocolate chips into the cooled muffin tins. Not too many! Just enough that you have a thin layer. Spoon the filling on top. You should have enough to fill each tin just about to the top.
Bake for 15-20 minutes. I recommend checking them every five minutes or so. They're ready to come out of the oven when the centers are still a bit jiggly. Place them (still in the tins) in the fridge to cool for at least an hour.
Meanwhile you can make your raspberry sauce.
Combine raspberries, water and sugar in a small saucepan and simmer until the mixture becomes slightly jelly-like. Remember to stir it every minute or so. Cool this in the fridge as well.

Once your cakes are cooled you can take them out of the tins and (carefully) peel the paper cups off. Put a spoonful of your raspberry sauce on top and they are ready to eat!

2 comments:

Abbey said...

I would like to try making them...maybe one day when I'm at Abigail's house...or when Mom and Rick are out of town ;)...Miss you!

Hannah said...

They were super good. You should make me.