So, friend, this is what I ended up making for that dinner party. This cobbler cheesecake was so beautiful when it came out of the oven. However, by the time I had the camera ready, this is all that was left.
It was so gorgeous, with the parchment paper all crinkly and brown and the perfectly round cheesecake nestled inside of the brown scorched parchment paper… all of those almonds glistening on top.
January is a tough month to come up with a creative dessert. It’s hard to follow Christmas, without doing Christmas. I didn’t want anything to chocolately-peppermint-Christmassy… but something sweet. Cheesecake was too pristine… so this combination of black berries/cobbler cheesecake was humble enough to offer just the right amount of coziness post-Christmas in dreary January. Do you know exactly what I mean?
I ended up messing up the original recipe, (I messed up on the part that said, “reserve” — I used it all up.) so I ended up with my own version, using the recipe for the world’s greatest crumble as the base… which was far better than what was printed in that magazine.
So, here’s the recipe:
- 1 3/4 cup of flour
- 1 1/2 cups of sugar
- 1 teaspoon sea salts
- 1 cup cold unsalted butter, cut into cubes.
- 1 cup rolled oats
- 1 cup black raspberries… or berries of your choice, mixed with 1/2 cup sugar.
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1 package (8 ounces) cream cheese, softened1/4 CUP SUGAR
- 1 egg
- 1/2 cup slivered almonds
- Preheat oven at 350 degrees F.
- Mix flour, sugar and salt with a fork.
- Using a fork, or pastry cutter, cut butter into flour mixture until it resembles coarse bread crumbs.
- Add oats, stirring them into the mixture.
- Reserve!!!! Stop! Get out a measuring cup and reserve 1/4 – 1/2 of this mixture.
- Pour the rest of the cobbler mixture into a spring-form pan… of if you don’t have one, like me, use a 9″ cake pan. Line that with parchment paper… but do not oil or butter the pan or the parchment paper. (It will burn.) (Go for the 9″ pan… because the parchment paper gives a beautiful “covering” to the cake.)
- In a bowl, beat cream cheese and sugar for 1 minute. Add egg; beat just until combined. Spread over crust. Carefully top with berries. Top with almonds and reserved crumb mixture.
- Bake for 50-60 minutes, or until center is set. Cool on a wire rack. Carefully run a knife around the edge of pan to loosen; remove sides of pan. Store in the refrigerator.
