This past week I made cheesecake twice. Which is funny because I'd only made it once before a few years ago. And though it was pretty well received, and not too, too scary, I've shied away from it since. But to comply with a birthday request I made it again. I used this Gingersnap-Pear Cheesecake recipe from Real Simple and didn't stray too much from it. It was so easy and was completely delicious! (The only annoying part was making the gingersnap crust. --Which wouldn't be a big deal but I don't have a food processor. I know; it's sad. ) It was enjoyed by all and the best end to a birthday meal of pork loin, curried apples with barley, mashed sweet potatoes and salad.
We also had a cheese course before hand. Yikes. The birthday boy said it was like Thanksgiving. Such compliments! We all rolled home.
Anyhow it was so easy that we decided to have another one the other night. It was Valentine's Day so we deserved another one. I used low fat cream cheese, which was basically just to make me feel better mentally, as I'm sure it didn't make much of a dent calorie-wise. We used the same recipe, but this time made a chocolate one. --Basically just added powered baking cocoa. It probably would have been better with a graham cracker crust, but there weren't any crackers, so gingersnaps with more powdered baking cocoa ended up doing the trick:
