I'll be quick with my blurb today!
- Paula Deen pumpkin cheesecake recipe.
- Substituted Pecan Sandies for Graham Crackers.
- Candied Pecans.
Ingredients
Crust:
1 dozen crumbled Pecan Sandies
3 tablespoons light brown sugar
1 stick melted salted butter
Filling:
3 (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, at room (softened)
1 (15-ounce) can pumpkin puree
3 eggs plus 1 egg yolk
1/4 cup sour cream
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon fresh ground nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Candied Pecans:
1 cup sugar
1 cup pecans
2 tbsp water
1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2) Crust: Pecan Sandies are brittle enough to crumble in your hands if you don't have a food processor (like me). Squish this together with the other crust ingredients and press down into a 9" springform pan.
3) Filling: Beat the cream cheese until it's nice and smooth. Beat in the rest of the wet ingredients. Make sure to save the eggs for last if you forgot to set out your cream cheese before you left for work and had to nuke it when you got home (not that you would do that). You don't want accidental scrambled eggs in your cake. Add the vanilla, spices, and flour.
4) Bake: Pour the filling into the crust. At this point you may want to watch out for lumps. I always seem to have a little bit of cream cheese plastered on the bottom of the mixing bowl at the end, and we don't want those making the cake look all blobby and gross. Bake for one hour, cool to room temperature, and chill covered in the fridge (ideally overnight).
IMPORTANT SUGGESTIONS: Put the springform pan on a cookie sheet in the oven. I found that a lot of water cooked out of the pumpkin and seeped out into my oven, making it a little stinky the next few times I used it. Blech. Because of this escaping moisture, your cheesecake may tend to crack. It doesn't matter, because we are going to cover the cake in nuts. However, if you are lucky enough to avoid cracking during baking, cook the cheesecake 5 to 10 minutes less, turn off the oven, crack it, and allow the oven and cheesecake to cool. This prevents cracking because it limits the differential thermal contraction of the cake, blah, blah, science, blah.
Above: Science
5) Candied Pecans: Grease or line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. Cook the sugar and water to 310 degrees. If you don't have a candy thermometer, this is the hard crack stage and you can tell when it has been reached by dropping a little of the candy into a glass of very cold water. If it has reached the proper temperature, it will be brittle and crack if you pull it out and try to bend it. Stir in the nuts, pour onto the cookie sheet, and allow to cool.
That is, as you may suspect, a tangerine holding down my parchment
6) Finishing: Crumble the bejeezus out of the pecans, discarding any extra lumps of sugar. If you won't be serving the cake immediately after preparing the pecans, store the nuts in a container with a piece of toast so they don't get soggy, and garnish at the last second.
Crust:
1 dozen crumbled Pecan Sandies
3 tablespoons light brown sugar
1 stick melted salted butter
Filling:
3 (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, at room (softened)
1 (15-ounce) can pumpkin puree
3 eggs plus 1 egg yolk
1/4 cup sour cream
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon fresh ground nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Candied Pecans:
1 cup sugar
1 cup pecans
2 tbsp water
1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2) Crust: Pecan Sandies are brittle enough to crumble in your hands if you don't have a food processor (like me). Squish this together with the other crust ingredients and press down into a 9" springform pan.
3) Filling: Beat the cream cheese until it's nice and smooth. Beat in the rest of the wet ingredients. Make sure to save the eggs for last if you forgot to set out your cream cheese before you left for work and had to nuke it when you got home (not that you would do that). You don't want accidental scrambled eggs in your cake. Add the vanilla, spices, and flour.
4) Bake: Pour the filling into the crust. At this point you may want to watch out for lumps. I always seem to have a little bit of cream cheese plastered on the bottom of the mixing bowl at the end, and we don't want those making the cake look all blobby and gross. Bake for one hour, cool to room temperature, and chill covered in the fridge (ideally overnight).
IMPORTANT SUGGESTIONS: Put the springform pan on a cookie sheet in the oven. I found that a lot of water cooked out of the pumpkin and seeped out into my oven, making it a little stinky the next few times I used it. Blech. Because of this escaping moisture, your cheesecake may tend to crack. It doesn't matter, because we are going to cover the cake in nuts. However, if you are lucky enough to avoid cracking during baking, cook the cheesecake 5 to 10 minutes less, turn off the oven, crack it, and allow the oven and cheesecake to cool. This prevents cracking because it limits the differential thermal contraction of the cake, blah, blah, science, blah.
Above: Science5) Candied Pecans: Grease or line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. Cook the sugar and water to 310 degrees. If you don't have a candy thermometer, this is the hard crack stage and you can tell when it has been reached by dropping a little of the candy into a glass of very cold water. If it has reached the proper temperature, it will be brittle and crack if you pull it out and try to bend it. Stir in the nuts, pour onto the cookie sheet, and allow to cool.
That is, as you may suspect, a tangerine holding down my parchment
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