Monday, April 15, 2013

Waiting for Cheesecake

I'm making cheesecake and I have to wait until the center of the thing is 150 degrees. It's only 128 degrees so far. The problem with cheesecake is that I like a dry version of a New York style cheesecake so when I was searching for recipes, if it said it was incredibly creamy, I went on to the next recipe. The cheesecake recipe I finally ended up with will probably be a little too creamy, but at least I learned I didn't have to bother with a water bath. That sounded like a pain in the neck anyway.

I read a whole lot of reviews of these recipes. The funny thing is that the reviewers seldom said that they made it and it was good because it tasted a certain way and had a certain texture. What they usually said was that they made it, changed this and this and that from the original recipe and it was incredible. Really? So how am I supposed to figure out if I'm going to like this recipe by reading your review then? And if you changed so much about it, why didn't you post a recipe yourself? Then, there were the critics. One guy wrote a half a page about how he'd know a good cheesecake because he'd been in the baking industry for ten years and we were supposed to believe that this cheesecake recipe was absolute shit. It just wasn't nice and I wanted to tell him that I didn't care how long he'd been baking cheesecake, I'm just as good at telling what I like to eat as he is and couldn't he just talk about the specific reasons he didn't like this recipe. My mother's been making cheesecake for forty-five years, much longer that the critic, and she loves her own cheesecake. I don't like hers as much as a New York style cheesecake because hers has jello in it, isn't baked at all, and sometimes has pineapple in it. Now, that tells you something about her recipe, doesn't it? If you happen to like the jiggly texture of a no-bake cheesecake, then my mother's recipe is the one for you.

Did I change anything about the recipe when I made it? Well, I pretty much followed the directions except that I sweetened it with stevia so I could eat it and I wouldn't have to rein Nick in quite so thoroughly. I tasted it before I added the eggs and the taste, if not the consistency, were just right. Baking it will do the trick. Once the baking is done, I still have to leave it in the oven for a few hours. That's a new one to me, but didn't I tell you I've never made cheesecake before? To tell you the truth, it was easy to put together, much easier than making pie. I just wish I didn't have to leave it in the oven for so long. My house smells delicious and I'm waiting here with a mean craving to visit a diner in New York city.

Thank you for listening, jb

 

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