Guide for Baking a Cheesecake
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You may want to add to your kitchen superpowers by mastering how to bake a cheesecake (and if you start sharing your homemade cheesecake with others there's no way it won't make you more popular). Here's a guide for how to make cheescake.
You'll be creating a crust on the bottom with graham cracker crumbs and a springform pan. Crush your cookie crumbs or graham cracker crumbs with a food processor. Once that is done pat down the crumbs at the bottom of the pan. Also continue the crumb layer up the sides for a few inches. You want the crust to be about a quarter inch thick. Now bake your graham cracker crust at about 375 degrees for about 10 minutes. Grease the sides of the pan above the crust with butter (keeps your cheesecake batter from sticking to the pan). Make sure the cheese filling you are using is normal and not fat-free, reduced-fat, whipped, etc. If not it's going to play havoc with the cheesecake batter as you cook. Make sure you've softened the cream cheese to room temp before using it or you risk getting lumps. In fact, leave all the ingredients at room temp for about half an hour before mixing them into your batter. |
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Use a hand mixer or electric mixer to beat your cream cheese into something with a nice, light texture. Now add your sugar and continue to beat, then add your other dry ingredients. Add the eggs individually and gently mix them the minimum amount of time so that they are blended into the batter but not overmixed. Lastly, stir in any fruit or chocolate pieces if you're going to add those.
Let the crust cool before adding the batter to it.
Ideally, you want to bake the cheesecake in a water bath. Basically, you want to bake cheesecake slowly and carefully, and a water bath is one of the best ways to do that. You will get a nice even bake at a low temperature.
Surround the bottom and sides of your pan with two layers of aluminum foil. Now set your foil-wrapped pan into a big pan, like a big roasting pan. You're going to add water to the larger pan until it is a few inches deep - you want it to end up about halfway up the outside of your cheesecake pan. Preheat your oven to whatever the recipe says and put the cheesecake/waterbath into the oven. In general, you want to remove the cheesecake when it looks a bit underdone, because it will continue to cook after you remove it via residual heat.
You're going to want to chill the cheesecake completely after baking it, usually overnight. Once it is chilled, run a knife around the edges to help separate the cheesecake from the pan. Unclasp your springform pan and remove it from the outside of the cheesecake. Take a long spatula or something similar and transfer your cheesecake onto a plate or whatever serving dish you have.
Add whatever you want and decorate however you want at this point, and enjoy.
Let the crust cool before adding the batter to it.
Ideally, you want to bake the cheesecake in a water bath. Basically, you want to bake cheesecake slowly and carefully, and a water bath is one of the best ways to do that. You will get a nice even bake at a low temperature.
Surround the bottom and sides of your pan with two layers of aluminum foil. Now set your foil-wrapped pan into a big pan, like a big roasting pan. You're going to add water to the larger pan until it is a few inches deep - you want it to end up about halfway up the outside of your cheesecake pan. Preheat your oven to whatever the recipe says and put the cheesecake/waterbath into the oven. In general, you want to remove the cheesecake when it looks a bit underdone, because it will continue to cook after you remove it via residual heat.
You're going to want to chill the cheesecake completely after baking it, usually overnight. Once it is chilled, run a knife around the edges to help separate the cheesecake from the pan. Unclasp your springform pan and remove it from the outside of the cheesecake. Take a long spatula or something similar and transfer your cheesecake onto a plate or whatever serving dish you have.
Add whatever you want and decorate however you want at this point, and enjoy.