Recipe: Pumpkin cheesecake

Ah...now finally we come to the dessert portion of our grand Thanksgiving holiday meal. Naturally, it's often a pie of some sorts, pumpkin or apple. But this year, I also decided to put a twist on the dessert and make a pumpkin cheesecake a la Cheesecake Factory style. What better way than to use up all that leftover pumpkin from Halloween than to bake it in a dessert?

When I was younger, I loved cheescake, especially the chocolate covered kind from Olive Garden. But as I got older, I found the cake too rich and creamy for my taste. I came across this recipe, however, online through the Food Network website, and all the reviews said even though they didn't like pumpkin or didn't like cheesecake, this hybrid dessert was to die for, a full five stars. I've also never had the pumpkin cheesecake at Cheesecake Factory, but I figured John loves cheesecake, so why not try to make this fully from scratch using our homemade pumpkin puree instead of the canned variety?

A funny story on the side about the pumpkin puree. We had spent all that time as described in this post to create this pumpkin puree from a leftover Halloween pumpkin. But when we were at the grocery store the other week, we passed by rows and rows of canned pumpkin puree, all going for less than $2 each. If I calculated it out, we basically saved 50 cents an hour by making it ourselves. We are some damn cheap labor.

Anyway, back to the cheesecake. We used the food processor to ensure even mixing but forgot to add the spices until after we had already poured it out into a bowl. The hand-mixing post-spices was a mistake because not all of the spices were distributed evenly, and we would get an occasional mouthful of ground ginger or ground cloves in the end product. Regardless, I was very happy with my first attempt at making cheesecake and pleasantly surprised that if you use a pre-baked graham cracker crust, the recipe really wasn't that tedious. Warning, though: this dessert is not for the weight-conscious. I guess you could try using fat-free sour cream and cream cheese. Let me know how that turns out.

And this concludes our edition of the Thanksgiving series. You can whip up any of these recipes for Christmas, too. Remember, if the Blind can Cook a fabulous feast, so can you.

Recipe: Pumpkin Cheesecake

Summary: Original recipe from Food Network's "Almost Famous" collection, which calls for a crust made from scratch

Ingredients

• 3 (9") pre-baked graham cracker crusts
• 4 (8 oz.) pkgs. cream cheese, softened
• 2.25 c. white sugar
• 1/4 c. sour cream
• 1 (15 oz.) can pumpkin puree
• 6 lg. eggs at room temp., lightly beaten
• 1 tbsp. vanilla extract
• 1 tsp. salt
• 2.5 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp. ground ginger
• 1/4 tsp. ground cloves
• 1/3 c. toasted pecans, roughly chopped (optional)

Instructions

1. Position rack in the center of the oven and preheat oven to 325 degrees.
2. Beat the cream cheese with a mixer until smooth. Add the sugar and beat until just light, scraping down the sides of the bowl and beaters as needed. Beat in the sour cream. Then add in the pumpkin puree, eggs, vanilla, salt, and the spices. Beat until just combined. Pour into the crusts.
3. Bake until the outside of the cheesecake sets but center is still loose, about 35 to 40 min. Then turn off oven and open door briefly to let out heat. Leave cheesecake in oven for 30 more min. Let cool on a rack. Cover and refrigerate at least 3 hrs. or overnight. Serve with a sprinkle of pecans.

Variations

My version of this recipe makes three 9" pie-sized cheesecakes. If you prefer to make one thicker, larger cheesecake, use the same ingredient measurements but refer to the original recipe linked above to make the graham cracker crust from scratch. With busy lives, though, I figured who had the time? Too bad I can't say my cheesecake is 100% made from scratch since the crust wasn't, but hey, the pumpkin was.

Cooking time (duration): 50

Diet type: Vegetarian

Meal type: dessert

Culinary tradition: USA (Traditional)

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