Blackberry balsamic = heaven… and cheesecake adventures, completed

While my friends from out of town were visiting, we took them on a small “tourist tour” of Seattle, and that of course included a stop at Pike Place Market. While there, trying not to spend all my money since I didn’t have a lot after a week of vacation, I discovered one of the booths has recently started selling Spenger products. They had samples of the vinegars and I immediately fell in love with the blackberry balsamic. If you pay attention to my blog, you’ll know, I love balsamic in all its forms — and I could have happily brought home the vintage, the raspberry, and the fig as well — the blackberry is exquisite. It’s this perfect blend of sweet and tang, that lends itself perfectly to anything from salmon to pancakes (both of which I’ve done this week). I highly recommend this particular flavour, if you like a balsamic you can experiment with in sweet and savory without having to do much to it. This morning, I made a Dutch Baby for breakfast, and topped it with some of the balsamic, slightly reduced, with some frozen strawberries tossed in as it heated, and mashed to mingle the flavours. It was heavenly.

To follow up on my previous cheesecake adventures post, here are the final results (please excuse the lighting; I was photographing in a hotel room. )

This ended up as a triple-layer cheesecake. It is, as follows:

Crust: graham cracker and pecans, with melted butter and a couple tablespoons of sugar.

Bottom layer: white chocolate flavoured cheesecake.

Middle layer: pumpkin cheesecake, with a spike of Drambuie (since it was what I had on hand).

Top layer: thin layer of plain cheesecake, with half a vanilla bean scraped into it.

Topped with homemade caramel sauce.

Preheat oven to 325…

Crust:

6-8 graham crackers

3oz pecan chips

4 Tbsp melted butter

3 Tbsp sugar

Crush crackers and pecans via your preferred method. Add butter and sugar, press into a springform pan. Wrap the pan’s outside in foil, because you’ll bake this in a water bath.

To make basic cheesecake:

Three 8oz packages of cream cheese, softened

4 eggs, room temperature

3/4 c sugar

pinch of salt

1/4 c heavy cream

1 tsp pure vanilla

Mix cream cheese and eggs, adding one egg at a time, until well blended. Add sugar and salt, and mix until incorporated, then add cream and vanilla. Once everything is mixed, seperate into three bowls — a small amount in one, and equal parts of the rest into two. In the small bowl, add 1/2 vanilla bean, scraped, and set aside.

For pumpkin cheesecake:

1 can pumpkin (because it’s easier — and pure pumpkin, not pie filling) — anywhere from 8-16oz, depending on how much pumpkin flavour you want. I used aprox. 10oz.

1/4 tsp each: Cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger

1-3 Tbsp (to taste, and option) burbon — or Drambuie, it works really well here!

First, you want to “dry” the pumpkin, so you don’t end up with too much excess liquid. Dump the pumpkin onto a few layers of paper towels, spread out evenly, and press some more paper towels on top. Press down to remove liquid, then add pumpkin and spices into the cheesecake; mix until incorporated.

For white chocolate cheesecake:

Melt 3-4oz of white chocolate in the microwave (1 min, stir, then 30 second intervals, stirring each time, until it’s melted). Pour into cheesecake mixture, and wisk.

Assemble the cheesecake:

Pour the white chocolate mixture onto the crust first. Top that layer with the pumpkin, then the vanilla infused cheesecakes. Fit the springform pan into a roasting pan, and fill the roasting pan halfway up the side of the springform with water. Bake for between 1 hour and 1 hour & 15 min, depending on your oven. Let cool completely before putting into the refrigerator to chill.

The caramel sauce I made was basically what I did for Christmas dinner, but with an extra 1/4 of heavy cream, added after everything was mixed, to make it more sauce-like.

It was delicious and most importantly, the birthday girl loved it. Yay.