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Chocolate Raspberry Cheesecake

A very rich and popular desert based on an old Philadelphia-brand Cream Cheese recipe. Your investment of time and ingredients will be well rewarded by the praise you will receive. As with most cheesecakes, it is easiest to slice with a thin, wet knife; if you slice ahead, away from your guests, try sawing down through the cake with a taut piece of dental floss.

This recipe has been tried with low-fat ingredients, but not by me. Too many substitutions would be needed to make any difference - if calories are a concern, pick another style of cheesecake. This can be mixed by hand - a strong hand, anyway - but a heavy-duty stand mixer will help a lot. If available, you will want a large and a small bowl for the mixer.

Expect to take five-ish hours minimum for making, baking, and cooling (which could be overnight, if you wish); this cheesecake stores well in the fridge for a few days, and freezes well.

Crust Ingredients: 24-30 cream-filled chocolate cookies, cream and all (but NOT double-cream); 1/2 stick melted, unsalted butter

Grind the cookies very fine - I do small batches (6 - 8 cookies) in a blender and transfer to a bowl. Pour in the melted butter and mix well by hand. Pack this mix evenly and firmly into the bottom of a deep, 10-inch spring-form pan. If it isn't a non-stick pan, you may want to cut an exact-size piece of parchment to line the bottom. The batter is a bit runny at first, so do a good job packing the crust mix into the edge; the firmer you pack it overall, the easier it will be to serve later.

First Cheese Mixture: 3 8-oz packages cream cheese; 1 1/4 cups sugar; 3 eggs; 1 cup sour cream; 1 teaspoon vanilla

Un-package the cheese into a large mixing bowl and leave out for at least an hour to soften. Thoroughly mix in the sugar, working up to medium speed then add in the eggs, one at a time, mixing well between each one. Blend in soured cream and vanilla then pour over the crust. You could jump ahead to baking now and you'd have a perfectly acceptable "plain" cheesecake.

Second Cheese Mixture: 1 8-oz package cream cheese; 6 oz melted, semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate; 1/3 cup strained raspberry preserves (Smucker's seems as good as fancier brands); Optional, but nice - 1/3 to 1/2 cup raspberry liqueur

Soften the cheese then mix in the chocolate, then the preserves it will work best in a small mixing bowl, but can be done in the large bowl used before if you just keep scraping the mix toward the beaters. Plop large spoonfuls of this mix into the plain mix; you are trying to embed chocolate through the cake, not make a layer. Avoid the very edge so the chocolate will only show when the cheesecake is sliced.

Put something under the pan to catch drips and bake at 325 degrees for 1 hour, 20 minutes. Loosen the cake from the rim with a thin knife or spatula then let it cool on a rack before removing rim. Don't rush this cooling in the fridge - the top will crack - and don't hurry this step - expect it to take a couple hours.

Guan Ache Top Coat: 6 oz semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate; 1/4 to 3/4 cup heavy or whipping cream

Melt the chocolate and stir in the cream. Less cream will make a frosting-consistency; more cream will make a pouring consistency - if you have a large crack in the top (I TOLD you to be patient!), use the thicker blend to frost over the problem. If you go for the smoother, poured blend, use the bottom of a spoon to push the chocolate up to, but not over, the edge all around. Let it cool and harden before putting in the fridge - at least an hour.

If I can get good, fresh, whole raspberry's and nice looking mint leaves, I like to mound a little whipped cream on the side of the slice and garnish with three berries and three leaves.

Learn more about this author, Steve Spongberg.
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