Baked Cheesecake with Strawberry Glaze

Cheesecake is a dessert consisting of a topping made of soft, fresh cheese on a base made from biscuit, pastry or sponge. The topping is frequently sweetened with sugar and flavored or topped with fruit, nuts, fruit flavored drizzle and/or chocolate. Savory cheesecakes also exist, served sometimes as hors d'oeuvre or with accompanying salads. There's nothing like a delicious piece of cheesecake to mark the end of a good meal. Here's one recipe to share with you.

Crust

1 1/2 c graham cracker crumbs

2 T sugar

2 Tbsp melted butter

Filling

20 ounce (2-1/2 pkgs - 8 ounce each) softened cream cheese

1 cup sugar

1/2 ts vanilla

3 eggs - beaten

Topping

1 cup mashed strawberries

1 cup sugar

3 T cornstarch

1/3 c water

Mix sugar and cracker crumbs with melted butter. Press on to the bottom of a 9" springform pan. Bake at 350° for 10 minutes in preheated oven. Remove from oven and let cool on a wire rack.
Whip cream cheese until it's smooth using food processor or an electrical mixer. Gradually beat in the sugar. Add beaten eggs and vanilla. Pour over the pre-baked graham craker crust in the springform pan.
Bake at 300° for an hour or until the center has set. Remove from oven and let cool on a wire rack.

Strawberry Glace
Blend the cornstarch and sugar together in a small sauce pan. Stir in water and strawberries, cook on medium heat, stirring constantly, until it thickens and begins to boil. Let boil one minute, stirring constantly. When the glace has cooled completely spread it on the cool cheesecake.
Refrigerate for 3 hours or more before serving.

How To Make Great Cheesecake
Here's some additional tips you can use to make your cheesecake a success:
To soften the cream cheese is to leave it in room temperature until it's softer than refrigerated. It's okay to let it reach room temperature as long as you don't leave it out too long.
You can prevent a cheesecake from cracking by running a thin knife around the edge, between the crust and the pan, just after removing the cake from the oven.
When using a springform pan let the cheesecake cool completely before removing the sides of the pan. Refrigerate before serving.
To cut a whole cheesecake into perfect slices, use dental floss instead of a knife. Prepare yourself with a lot of unwaxed, unflavored dental floss.
Saw your way down through the cheesecake, using lots of sawing motion and pressure when cutting through the crust, then let loose of one end and pull the floss out from the other end. Don't bring it back to the top, it would just make a mess.
Wipe your hands and change floss regularily, otherwise it gets slippery.
When slicing with a knife, the knife should have a long and thin blade to make clean cuts. Dip the knife in hot water and clean the blade between every slice. That way the slices gets a nice and clean cut without crushing the cake.





Since 2006 Simon Byholm has published a cheesecake cookbook, 91 Cheesecake Recipes, as a PDF ebook. You can find the latest version as well as a deliciousturtle cheesecake recipe on his site 91CheesecakeRecipes.com