Cheesecake! oh wonderful cheesecake!

So the boyfriend was beggin for cheesecake, but more importantly he was begging for cheesecake for his grandfather's birthday party/everyone in his family who was born in January. Well, I can't remember ever having made a cheesecake before so I decided to practice first. I used a recipe from Alton Brown for a sourcream cheesecake. It came out amazing, but was missing some extra something to make it mine. So the boyfriend suggested adding orange zest and ginger. This turned out amazing!! We also decided to forgo the traditional graham cracker crust and instead made ours out of ginger snaps. Delicious!

Well here's about the recipe we used:

Crust:
38 ginger snaps, crushed but still with big chunks.
1 stick of butter, melted

Filling:
1 1/4c sour cream
20 oz cream cheese (2.5 packages)
1 c sugar
2 eggs
5 egg yolks
1/3 c heavy cream
1 tbs vanilla extract
1/2 tbs cinnamon
1/2 tbs nutmeg
1 tbs orange zest
1/2 tbs grated ginger

Preheat your oven to 300. Butter a springform pan or line a regular pan with parchment paper. Mix ginger snaps and butter til coated and spread evenly in bottom of pan. Bake for 10 minutes at 300 F. Lower oven temp to 250

In a stand mixer mix sour cream on low for about 30 seconds. Add cream cheese and sugar, mix on low until sugar is wet. Then turn up to medium and mix until smooth. In another bowl mix together eggs, cream, and vanilla. Pour this mixture slowly into mixer, scraping down bowl halfway through. Once this is smooth add the cinnamon and nutmeg. The mix should be speckled. Then add the orange zest and ginger and mix it well making sure to scrape the bottom of the bowl to get any bits that the paddle misses. Once the mixture is super smooth pour it into the pan with the crust. Put this pan into a larger pan. If you are using a springform surround it with foil to prevent leaks. Fill the larger pan with warm water just covering the crust line of the smaller pan. Place in oven and bake for 1 hour at 250 F. After an hour, turn off the oven and open the door for 1 minute. Then shut the oven door and leave in oven 1 more hour. Place in refridgerator for another 3-4 hours or overnight if you can.

That's all I did, but feel free to garnish with more gingersnaps or orange slices if you would like!

3rd and 4th cookies!!

Well, I quickly flew through the 3rd and 4th cookies of the platter. The first of which was Peppermint Meltaways:

1 c butter softened
1/2 c powdered sugar
1/2 tsp peppermint extract
1-1/4 c all purpose flour
1/2 c cornstarch
Frosting:
2 tbsp butter softened
1-1/2 c powered sugar
2 tbsp milk (I added a touch more milk to get a smoother consistency)
1/4 tsp peppermint extract
2-3 drops red food coloring
1/2 c crushed peppermint candies

1. In a small bowl, cream butter and confectioners' sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the extract. Combine flour and cornstarch; gradually add to creamed mixture and mix well.

2. Shape into 1 in balls. Place 2 in apart on ungreased baking sheets. Bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes or until bottoms are lightly browned. Remove to wire racks to cool.

3. In a small bowl, beat butter until fluffy. Add the confectioners' sugar, milk, extract and food coloring; beat until smooth. Spread over cooled cookies; sprinkle with crushed candies. Store in an airtight container.

These cookies were super easy to make and I knocked them out in about 45 minutes! The icing was fun to apply, with a butter knife. It was also quite fun to smash the candies...I did so by leaving them in their wrapping and hitting them with a rolling pin.

After these were done, I moved onto just simple chocolate chip cookies. Now I prize this recipe and it will be included on the recipe cards that come with each platter, but I won't be posting it here. However, this recipe makes a lot of cookies! And they always seem to turn out very well, even if sometimes the oven gets too hot, or I forget to turn on a timer.

Since it made so many cookies, after this batch I decided to enjoy some cookies and milk and watch A Nightmare Before Christmas! Great night over all if I do say so myself!

First cookie of the saga...

Well the first cookie of the cookie platter saga begins tonite! And the first cookies shall be...Candy Cane Cookies! Now I've made these before and they're a huge hit with my family, they're also very easy to do...

1/2 tube refigereated sugar cookie dough (softened)
2 tbs all purpose flour
1/2 tsp peppermint extract
1/2 tsp red food coloring

In a large bowl, beat the cookie dough, flour and extract until smooth. Divide dough in half; mix food coloring into one portion.

Shape 1 tsp of white dough into a 6 in. rope. Shape 1 tsp of red dough into a 6 in rope. Place ropes side by side; press together lightly and twist.

Place on an ungreased baking sheet; curve top of cookie to form handle of cane. Repeat with remaining dough, placing cookies 2 in. apart on baking sheets.

Bake at 350 for 8-10 minutes or until set. Cool for 2 minutes before carefully removing to wire racks.

Also if you have the time...here's a quick tip for easy teaspoons of dough. Pat your dough into a rectangle on a baking sheet and freeze until almost solid. Then slice it into a grid. Pick up and roll pieces for baking! All cookies are then the same size!!

So...at least an hour and a half later...I'm done with candy cane cookies...for now at least! The problem with this recipe is that it doesn't turn out nearly as many cookies as it promises. This could be my fault because I like bigger cookies...yep it's my fault, but anyways I will have to revisit this one before sending out cookie platters!