Peppermint Cheesecake

I've started taking requests.

I needed to break out of the things I usually make, so before a Christmas party I hosted, I asked some people what dessert they wanted.

Cheesecake it was.

I've only eaten cheesecake a couple times....I'm not a big fan, so making this was an adventure.

Start with some chocolate wafer cookies.



Grind these up into tiny crumbs and combine them with melted butter and sugar. Press them down and along the sides of a springform pan.

Do you see how close my laptop was to the pan? Probably not a good idea.



Mix up cream cheese, half and half, vanilla extract, peppermint extract, eggs until smooth and gorgeous. Stir in some crushed up peppermint candies (I used candy canes).

Pour the mixture over the crust in the springform pan and pop the pink cheesecake into the oven for about an hour and a half. This, by the way, is 45 minutes longer than the original recipe called for. Yikes.

When I pulled it out, it wasn't completely set, but I was tired of waiting on it, so I just hoped that it was good enough!

After spending the night in the fridge, it was perfectly set and ready for taste testing.

Delicious! This is a really great and easy cheesecake recipe that could really be tweaked and changed!

Peppermint Cheesecake

(serves 10)

Crust

1 9-ounce box chocolate wafer cookies

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted

Filling

2 lbs. cream cheese, room temperature

1 cup sugar

4 large eggs

1/4 cup half and half

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp peppermint extract

1/3 cup crushed peppermint candies

For the crust:

Wrap the outside of a springform pan with aluminum foil. Finely grind the cookies with sugar in a food processor. Add butter and press mixture onto bottom and up the sides of the pan. Refrigerate while preparing filling.

For the filling:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Beat cream cheese in large bowl until smooth. It is really important to start with room temperature cream cheese! Add sugar and beat until well blended. Add eggs 1 at a time, beating until blended after each addition. Beat in half and half, and then the extracts. Stir in candies and pour into pan.

Bake until filling is mostly set and the edges are puffed - this will probably take between an hour and an hour and a half.

Refrigerate overnight.