Easter Cheesecake (late post, as usual!)

I recently went into my bookmarks on Google and was horrified to figure out I had THOUSANDS of websites linked with those little gold stars. I confess; I have a slight hoarding tendency. It's true. I decided to go through all of these links because, hello! Who needs that many bookmarks? After about 5 hours of "Click, delete. Click, delete." I gave up. It is what it is. What I was proud to find though was Martha Stewarts' recipe for Easter Cheesecake. I was drooling over this recipe from the moment I saw it, but tucked it away in the black hole that is my bookmark tab because it's just what I do.

I'll be the first to admit that I make a mean tasting cheesecake. Ask any of the 3 people I've made one for. What I don't have the ability to do though is make a "pretty" cheesecake. Mine are hideous. Almost inedible looking. Now, I'm used to my cooking. My cooking is horrid. But my baking is not. So to bake something and have it be downright nasty looking, oh how it hurt. I've tried and tried to make these things pleasing to the eye, but no matter what, they look.........gross. Then it clicked. Put that damn cheesecake IN something! All the taste, none of the darkened bumpy nastiness! (I'm serious, U-G-L-Y!) I also don't want to take someone else's recipe and just make it. That's not me, not mine. So after a night of throwing ideas around in my head, I decided to incorporate it into a cake.

Honestly, the thought of making a hideously delicious cheesecake is a little intimidating. So I decided to do what I would normally do in that situation and half ass it so I could GTFO! I used......boxed cake mix. But that's okay! No one is too good for boxed cake mix! Sometimes it's just what you need. I went back and forth about a fruit filling of some type to layer between the cakes, but ultimately scratched that idea. It would totally be easy to do, if that is what you fancy, but I just didn't feel like adding an extra step to the process (LAZY). I didn't want this cake to be too sweet, so a traditional buttercream or 7 minute frosting was out of the question. So why not cream cheese frosting? Hey, it ties it all together. I have a problem with being pretty biased towards cream cheese frosting. I'm good at making it, it comes out tasty.....why fix what isn't broken? Boom. Done.

I spaced the process of this cake out over a couple days, mainly because I kept effing things up. My first set of cheesecakes came out hideous (figured), but they also didn't want to come out of the pan. I haven't tried to make cheesecake without a springform pan or crust before, so big fat DUH on my part. I should have realized. Luckily I had halved the recipe to begin with, so I still had ingredients on hand. The next round I lined the bottom of the pans with parchment paper so I could actually get them out. A little advice though........never leave anything that resembles cooking spray next to where you set the spray down on the counter. Doesn't turn out too well. Washed pans, started over. Sigh. The cake of course came out perfect. Thank you Pillsbury Dough Boy, you are on my side! I had also completely forgotten that I wanted to do a cream cheese frosting, and instead whipped up a 7 minute frosting (recipe courtesy of Paula Deen). It wasn't until I taste tested it that it hit me. DUR! Sometimes my brain refuses to work right. Oh well, I'll figure out what to do with it. (Dead giveaway that I wrote the beginning of this post BEFORE I actually started making the cake.)

Putting everything together is super easy. I cut the cake rounds in half to make 4 pieces, and had the two cheesecakes ready. I thought about putting some frosting between all the layers, but I wasn't sure if I had enough to do that AND frost the whole outside of the cake, so I skipped it. Don't skip it. Double up on the frosting recipe if you want to, or use a fruit paste of some sorts. Use anything that will bind it all together. Even chocolate. Yummy!

Once you have your layers stacked, start frosting the outside. I start on top and work my way down the sides. I should probably invest in a frosting spatula. Once frosted you can pretty much do whatever you want to finish it up. Coconut, sprinkles, slivered almonds, fruits........anything would work. Endless possibilities! Mine is kind of the blah, stock version. Next time I'll be stepping it up!

VANILLA EASTER CHEESECAKE

(Cake)
1 box vanilla cake mix

Prepare as directed in two 9 inch round pans. Remove from pans and let cool completely on a wire rack. Take a long serrated knife and cut each cake in half lengthwise. Cover and set aside. (You will only need 3 of the layers)


(Cheesecake)
4  8oz. packages cream cheese, room temperature
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 1/2 cups sugar
4 large eggs, lightly beaten
Grated zest of 1 lemon
Grated zest of 1 orange
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 325. Grease two 9 inch round cake pans lined with parchment paper and set aside. In a large bowl beat cream cheese, heavy cream, and sugar with mixer until smooth. Add eggs and beat until just incorporated. Mix in zest and vanilla.



When baking, some like to also use a water bath. I didn't this time, but feel free if you like! I personally haven't seen a difference in cakes.


(Frosting)12 oz. cream cheese (1 1/2 packs), room temperature
1/2 cup unsalted butter (1 stick), room temperature
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 cup powdered sugar, sifted

Beat cream cheese, butter, and vanilla in a large bowl until smooth. Add powdered sugar in 4 parts, mixing well each time.


(Assembly)
Take the bottom of one cake and set on a plate, or any flat surface. Spread a little of the cream cheese frosting over the top, mainly focusing on the middle. Put one of the cheesecakes on top of the cake layer, then spread a little of the frosting on top of that and add the bottom layer of the other cake. Repeat this step, but after the second cheesecake, finish off with the top layer of the vanilla cake. Take the rest of the frosting and cover the entire outside of the cake, starting from the top. Then garnish (optional).