Neapolitan Cheesecake

Summer vacation comes to an end..

For the Chocolate Crumb Crust

Vanilla Wafer Crumbs (about 45 wafers)
1/2 cup confectioners' sugar
1/4 cup cocoa
1/3 cup melted butter

For Cheesecake Filling

1 pkg. (10 oz.) frozen strawberries, thawed, drained
3 pkg. (8 oz. each) cream cheese, softened
1 1/2 cups sugar
3 eggs
1/3 cup sour cream
3 tbsp. plus 1 tsp. flour, divided
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise, seeds scraped
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. red food color (optional)


1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

2. For the chocolate crumb crust, in a small bowl, stir together 1-1/2 cups vanilla wafer crumbs (about 45 wafers), confectioners' sugar and cocoa; stir in melted butter. Press mixture firmly onto bottom of 9-inch springform pan. Bake 8 minutes; cool slightly.

3. In blender container or food processor, puree strawberries to yield 1/2 cup; set aside.

4. In large bowl, beat cream cheese with sugar until smooth and creamy. Add eggs, sour cream, 3 tbsps flour, vanilla, 1 tsp. vanilla bean and salt; beat until smooth.

5. In separate bowl, stir together 1-1/3 cups cheese mixture, strawberries, remaining 1 teaspoon flour and food color, if desired.

6Carefully spoon 2 cups vanilla batter over prepared crust. Pour strawberry batter over vanilla batter; smooth surface.

7. Bake 10 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees; continue baking 55 to 60 minutes or until center of cheesecake is almost set. Remove from oven to wire rack. Cool 30 minutes. With knife, loosen cake from side of pan. Cool completely; remove side of pan. Refrigerate several hours before serving.

Makes 10 to 12 servings

Strawberry Almond Cake

Sadly, I was unable to do this months Daring Bakers Challenge. Which, really, I was so anger at myself for never getting around to it. By the time I actually had time to do anything, this month was already over. I couldn't believe just how fast this summer has been going! And this months challenge was one that I really wanted to do! It look really good! I know I'm going to bake it sometime soon when I have time.

Though I haven't had time to really bake much, I had enough time to make a quick cake. Not a difficult cake (though, I'd really want to). We still have so many strawberries that I still don't now what else to do with them. I knew that I wanted to use strawberries, but I wanted a nut of some sort. An almond cake sounds really good with strawberries. I also used the strawberry filling I used for my Strawberry Cream Cake, which was really good with the Almond Cake.

The cake itself was amazing. The texture was just right. Soft and light, nice and moist. First bite, you just have to close your eyes and savor the taste. It's just so luscious. The strawberry filling and the strawberry frosting with the cake was really good. I might ever try blueberries or blackberries next time. That sounds really good!!

Recipe

Cake

3/4 cup cake flour
1/4 cup yellow cornmeal
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup almond paste, cut into pieces
1 1/4 cups confectioners' sugar
1/2 tsp. vanilla
2 eggs
4 egg yolks
1/4 cup sour cream

Strawberry Filling

2 quarts fresh strawberries, washed, dried, and stemmed
4–6 tbsp. sugar
2 tbsp. kirsch
Pinch of salt

Strawberry Frosting


8 ounces strawberries
1/4 cup sugar
4 tbsp. butter, softened
3 to 4 cups powdered sugar


1. For the cake,Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour round 8-inch cake pan. In a medium bowl, whisk together the cornmeal, cake flour and baking powder and set aside.

2. Using a stand mixer with a paddle attachment, beat the butter and almond paste on high speed until smooth, about 5 minutes. Reduce speed to low and slowly add confectioners' sugar. Mix until thoroughly combined and light and fluffy.

3. Raise speed to high and add the vanilla extract, whole eggs and egg yolks, 1 at a time. Mix until well combined. Reduce speed to medium and add the sour cream and dry ingredients and mix until just incorporated.

4. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan and smooth the surface with a spatula. Bake in the lower third of the oven for 35 minutes, or until the cake is golden and pulls away from the sides of the pan. Transfer pan to a wire rack and let cool. Remove from pan.

5. For the strawberry filling, Halve 24 of best-looking berries and reserve. Quarter remaining berries; toss with 4 to 6 tablespoons sugar (depending on sweetness of berries) in medium bowl and let sit 1 hour, stirring occasionally. Strain juices from berries and reserve (you should have about 1/2 cup). In a food processor fitted with metal blade, give macerated berries five 1-second pulses (you should have about 1 1/2 cups). In small saucepan over medium-high heat, simmer reserved juices and Kirsch until syrupy and reduced to about 3 tablespoons, 3 to 5 minutes. Pour reduced syrup over macerated berries, add pinch of salt, and toss to combine. Set aside until cake is cooled.

6. For Strawberry Frosting, first wash the strawberries well, then hull and slice. Put the slices into a bowl and sprinkle sugar onto and toss well. Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours or overnight. Drain excess juices from strawberries. Crush and mash strawberries. Beat butter until smooth. Add 3 cups of powdered sugar and the crushed strawberries. Slowly beat until sugar is blended in, then beat on medium speed until fluffy. Add more powdered sugar as needed until frosting is a nice spreading consistency. Frost the cooled cake and decorate with sliced strawberries.

7. To assemble the cake, slice cake into two even layers. Place bottom layer on cardboard round or cake plate and arrange ring of 20 strawberry halves, cut sides down and stem ends facing out, around perimeter of cake layer. Pour about 1/2 cup of pureed berry mixture in center, then spread to cover any exposed cake. Gently spread about 1 t 1 1/2 cup of Strawberry Frosting over berry layer, leaving 1/2-inch border from edge. Place top layer on cake and press down gently. Spread Strawberry Frosting on top layer. Decorate as you want. Serve, or chill for up to 4 hours.

Strawberry Cupcakes

For me, really hate summer. Honestly I do. I do not like the heat or the humidity that comes. I'm the fall and winter kind of person. There isn't really anything at all that I like about summer... Well, I mean, except for the sales.

Fruit sales to be exact. Fruits, like strawberry's, blueberries, raspberries and watermelon are usually pretty pricey during other seasons and I tend to stay away from really getting to much fruit during fall or winter being that they are to expensive! We really don't want to have to pay for it (we're pretty cheap). But when summer comes, we go crazy on buying fruit!

There are so many things to do with fruits. What we usually do is we make a fruit salad (which doesn't last long around here), parfaits, smoothies, baked goods (what I usually do with them), there's so much you can do with fruit. Over here, strawberries have been Buy 1, Get 1, so it's what we've been getting the most. Also, it's my mums favorite. Ever since she started new medication for her lupus, she's been needing to eat a lot of fruit, like strawberries and grapes, because the new medication she's taking will make her gain a lot of weight if she's not careful. And she'd rather not gain weight so she's been trying to be really careful as to what she eats.

I thought we had a lot of strawberries in the fridge right now so I decided to put the strawberries to better (sweeter) use. It won't be that big of a deal to use some of them for myself. The cupcakes are very simple. The texture of these cupcakes are moist and light and I really, really liked them with the cream cheese frosting. The added flavor to the cream cheese is delicious. I didn't know if it would do much for the frosting but the addiction to it was amazing! It was so good! It's classic.

Recipe

For the Cupcakes

1 1/3 cups flour
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/8 tsp. salt
1/2 cup strawberry sauce
1/4 cup milk
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs


For the Strawberry Sauce

2 cups of fresh strawberries, stem removed
Sugar to taste


For Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting

8 ounces cream cheese
1/2 stick butter
3 1/2 - 4 cups powdered sugar, sifted
1/4 cup of strawberry sauce


1. For the Strawberry Sauce, macerate strawberries with about 1-2 tbs sugar for 15 minutes. Put strawberries in a small saucepan and heat under medium heat with lid on. Cook strawberries for approximately 15 minutes till strawberries cook down and become soft and saucy. Adjust sweetness with sugar until you get the desired sweetness. Using a hand blender, puree until you get the desired smoothness or chunkiness. Cool before using in recipe.

2. For the cupcakes, preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grab a large bowl and beat the butter and the sugar together until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time. Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl. Measure out milk and strawberry sauce together.

3. Add about a fourth of the flour to the butter mixture and beat to combine. Add about one third the milk mixture and beat until combined. Repeat, alternating flour and milk and ending with the flour mixture. Scoop into cupcake papers about 3/4 full. Bake for 20-22 minutes.

4. For Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting, bring cheese and butter to room temperature. Sift powdered sugar into a bowl. Beat butter and cheese at medium speed until creamy. Add half of the sugar, beat until combined. Add strawberry sauce until you achieve the right color and flavor but making sure not to add too much or the frosting will be too soft. Gradually add any remaining sugar until you get to the consistency and sweetness you like.

Strawberry Cream Cake

Seems likes it's getting muggier and muggier here in Florida each day. The non stop pouring rain and the rising heat is killer. I love and hate Florida. This being one of the reasons I hate Florida.

Since it's been so very hot out, I haven't really been baking as much as I use to. I mean, why would I stand around a hot oven and sweat my butt off even more than I already am? It also doesn't help that our air conditioner seriously sucks. I swear out conditioner literally loathes us. We've tried so many times to get it fixed, yet, it always decides to brake down and not work. It's always pms-ing!

But, I wasn't going to let the heat keep me from baking for to long. I've been really craving cake lately, which is strange because I don't exactly love cake. I like it, but it's not something I necessarily love. But I wanted it. And the heat was not going to keep me from making cake, no I was not. My mom found a recipe awhile back for a Strawberry Cream Cake in Cooks Illustrated that I knew I wanted to make eventually, but after seeing Lisa's, Pittsburgh Needs Eated, post on the cake, I decided that this was what I was going to make.

The cake turned out excellent! One of the best I've had, seriously. It was so light and so tasty. I couldn't help but get another slice. It was so good. It's a great light and refreshing cake for the summer!

Recipe

Cake

1 1/4 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup sugar
5 large eggs (2 whole and 3 separated)
6 tbsp. butter , melted
2 tbsp. water
2 tsp. vanilla

Strawberry Filling

2 quarts fresh strawberries, washed, dried, and stemmed
4–6 tbsp. sugar
2 tbsp. kirsch
Pinch of salt

Whipped Cream

8 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
1/8 tsp. salt
2 cups heavy cream


1. For the cake,Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour round 9 by 2-inch cake pan or 9-inch springform pan and line with parchment paper. Whisk flour, baking powder, salt, and all but 3 tablespoons sugar in mixing bowl. Whisk in 2 whole eggs and 3 yolks (reserving whites), butter, water, and vanilla and whisk until smooth.

2. In clean bowl of standing mixer fitted with whisk attachment, beat remaining 3 egg whites at medium-low speed until frothy, 1 to 2 minutes. With machine running, gradually add remaining 3 tablespoons sugar, increase speed to medium-high, and beat until soft peaks form, 60 to 90 seconds.

3. Stir one-third of whites into batter to lighten; add remaining whites and gently fold into batter until no white streaks remain. Pour batter into prepared pan and bake until toothpick or wooden skewer inserted into center of cake comes out clean, 30 to 40 minutes. Cool in pan 10 minutes, then cool completely for about 2 hours.

4. For the strawberry filling, Halve 24 of best-looking berries and reserve. Quarter remaining berries; toss with 4 to 6 tablespoons sugar (depending on sweetness of berries) in medium bowl and let sit 1 hour, stirring occasionally. Strain juices from berries and reserve (you should have about 1/2 cup). In a food processor fitted with metal blade, give macerated berries five 1-second pulses (you should have about 1 1/2 cups). In small saucepan over medium-high heat, simmer reserved juices and Kirsch until syrupy and reduced to about 3 tablespoons, 3 to 5 minutes. Pour reduced syrup over macerated berries, add pinch of salt, and toss to combine. Set aside until cake is cooled.

5. For the whipped cream, place cream cheese, sugar, vanilla, and salt in bowl of standing mixer fitted with whisk attachment. Whisk at medium-high speed until light and fluffy, 1 to 2 minutes, scraping down bowl with rubber spatula as needed. Reduce speed to low and add heavy cream in slow, steady stream; when almost fully combined, increase speed to medium-high and beat until mixture holds stiff peaks, 2 to 2 1/2 minutes more, scraping bowl as needed.

6. To assemble the cake, slice cake into three even layers (or two like me). Place bottom layer on cardboard round or cake plate and arrange ring of 20 strawberry halves, cut sides down and stem ends facing out, around perimeter of cake layer. Pour one half of pureed berry mixture (about 3/4 cup) in center, then spread to cover any exposed cake. Gently spread about one-third of whipped cream (about 1 1/2 cups) over berry layer, leaving 1/2-inch border from edge. Place middle cake layer on top and press down gently (whipped cream layer should become flush with cake edge). Repeat with 20 additional strawberry halves, remaining berry mixture, and half of remaining whipped cream; gently press last cake layer on top. Spread remaining whipped cream over top; decorate with remaining cut strawberries. Serve, or chill for up to 4 hours.

Mixed Berry Cobbler

To be completely frank, I have never had a cobbler in my life, nor have I ever baked one. Shocking, right? But, I guess there's always something that not everyone has tried before. For me, it's the cobbler. I didn't really even know what the heck a cobbler was. From what I heard, it was basically just a fruit filling with a biscuit on top. This was a reason as to why I really never tried a cobbler. It just didn't sound to appealing to me. However, I was extremely excited to find that this weeks challenge for TWD was a Mixed Berry Cobbler. Now I had to try a cobbler.

Now, I knew that making a cobbler was very easy (which this was), and that it didn't take to many ingredients or anything difficult to make it. It was just the taste that matter. But, I didn't see how you could really go wrong. In the end, it was just how sweet you, as the person eating it, would want it. I made mine pretty sweet (I have a major sweet tooth).

I didn't make it into a huge cobbler. Instead, I made them into individual ramekins (Who knows if I'd really like it or not, or if everyone else would). In my opinion, they looked prettier in little individual portions anyways. I only used blueberries and strawberries (But I used more blueberries than anything ;]). I didn't really have any blackberries or raspberries on hand. If I did, I would have definitely had used them!

So, what did I think of my first cobbler? Well, after waiting for what seemed like forever and smelling the fruit in oven with my mouth watering, I finally got to take my first bite... And... It was really good! To my surprise, it didn't make me feel bloated for I thought that it might be a bit heavy (I was thinking of pie here...). But it didn't. Which was good. I've now discovered cobbler and it will be something I will make more often now ;]. Go Cobblers! :D

Recipe

For the topping

2 cups flour
1 tbsp. baking powder
3 tbsp. sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
6 tbsp. cold butter, cut up
3/4 cup cold heavy cream

For the filling

5 cups mixed berries, frozen or fresh
4 to 5 tbsp. sugar (depending on your taste)
1 tbsp. cornstarch
Grated zest of 1/2 lemon or lime
1/4 tsp. (or more, to taste) ground black pepper (optional)

Vanilla ice cream, for serving


1. Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Butter a 9-inch deep-dish pie plate and put it on a baking sheet lined with parchment or a silicone mat.

2. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, sugar and salt. Drop in the butter and, using your fingers, toss to coat the pieces of butter with flour. Quickly, working with your fingertips (my favorite method) or a pastry blender, cut and rub the butter into the dry ingredients until the mixture is pebbly. You'll have pea-size pieces, pieces the size of oatmeal flakes and pieces in between — and that's just right.

3. Pour the cream over the dry ingredients and toss and gently turn the ingredients with a fork until you've got a very soft dough. When the dough comes together, you'll probably still have dry ingredients at the bottom of the bowl — just use a spatula or your hands to mix and knead the dough until it's evenly blended.

4. Don't overdo it; it's better to have a few dry spots than an overworked dough. Even with all the flour mixed in, the dough will be soft and sticky.

5.Turn the dough out onto a sheet of wax paper or plastic wrap, cover with another sheet of paper or plastic and gently press or roll the dough into a circle that is a scant 9 inches in diameter. Don't worry about getting the size exact or about seeing that the edges are even — this is a very homey dessert, and a rough-around the-edges biscuit adds to its charm. Set the dough aside while you prepare the fruit.

6. To make the filling, Toss all the ingredients into a large bowl and stir to mix. Turn the fruit into the buttered pie plate and top with the biscuit. Using a small sharp knife, cut about 6 slits in the dough, just as you would for a piecrust. Then, using either the knife or a large piping tip, cut a circle out of the center of the dough.

7. Bake the cobbler for 60 to 75 minutes, or until the top is puffed and golden brown and the fruit is bubbling steadily up through the center steam hole and all around the scallopy edges of the biscuit. Transfer the pie plate to a rack and let the cobbler cool for at least 30 minutes before serving.

8. Serve the cobbler warm or at room temperature, with ice cream.

STORING: Once the cobbler cools, you can keep it lightly covered for a few hours at room temperature, but you really should enjoy it the day it is made. Don't refrigerate it — the biscuit will lose its appealing texture.