Bad Moon Rising Cheesecake (Bittersweet Chocolate Cheesecake)

It's funny how one idea morphs into something completely different after the first attempt crashes and burns. This super decadent and gorgeously dark bittersweet chocolate cheesecake began as an idea for an easy no-bake chocolate cheesecake, made with a ready made cookie crust topped with a jack-o-lantern face made of melting chocolate. In my mind, I envisioned it to look like a larger version of my Jack-o-lantern cupcakes. Seemed pretty straight forward, right? And the best part, was that it was supposed to be quick and easy... What could go wrong with a no bake cheesecake, ready-made cookie crust and a jack-o-lantern face? Well...Let me tell you...a whole lot could go wrong with this silly, simple idea.  First and most importantly, the no bake cheesecake was not good. The texture was too soft. It was not dense like a cheesecake should be. Honestly, the best part of it was the damn cookie crust. But the kicker was, and I should've known based on my hate-hate relationship with those pesky candy melts...the candy melts nearly broke me this time. I'm still cursing those little buggers because i could not get them to cooperate. My jack-o-lantern face was a hot mess. So I threw the whole thing into the garbage. 

I also scrapped the notion of quick and easy and decided to make a real baked cheesecake with homemade cookie crust instead. Which was way easier afterall. It baked in a low temp oven for over an hour so there was  no work involved to watch it bake. When I pulled it out of the oven, I realized I forgot to tap the pan a little to get the air bubbles out of the batter because the cheesecake came out looking a whole lot like the surface of the moon with little craters and divots. 
Sometimes the best part about making Halloween food is that the imperfections become the inspiration for the dish! I ditched the jack-o-lantern idea after brainstorming with my husband and toyed with the moon idea since the cheesecake now looked like a moon, a New Moon, an Eclipsed Moon...I doodled some ideas and my husband came up with Bad Moon Rising. And instead using those dastardly Candy  Melts, I made my bad moon face out of Cookie icing. Enjoy! 
🎃10 days until Halloween🎃

Bad Moon Rising Cheesecake (Bittersweet Chocolate Cheesecake)

Crust
1 package chocolate sandwich cookies (I used Dark Chocolate Oreos®)
2 T melted butter
Batter
2-8 oz. packages cream cheese
1 t. vanilla extract
2/3 cup sugar
1 T all purpose flour
1/2 t. ground cinnamon
3 eggs
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips melted in 1 T cream
1 oz. black food coloring 
Decorating
Black cookie icing or black candy melts
Black sugar crystals
Template (see below)

Preheat oven to 275 degrees.

Crust: Place cookies in a food processor and process cookies into crumbs and transfer crumbs into a small bowl. Add melted butter and mix until well combined. Line the bottom of a Springform pan with a round of parchment paper or spray lightly with cooking spray. Press crumbs into the bottom of the pan and smooth out crumbs to create an even firm crust. Refrigerate while prepping the cheesecake batter.

Batter: In a large bowl, beat cream cheese and vanilla until combined.  Add sugar and beat until fluffy. Add flour and cinnamon and mix. Beat in eggs one at a time, scraping down sides of the bowl after each addition. 

Melt chocolate: In a microwave-safe bowl, add 1 T cream to chocolate chips and heat for 1-2 minutes on defrost setting of your microwave. Take care not to overheat. Stir well until smooth and let cool on counter a bit. 

Add melted chocolate into batter and beat until combined. Add black food coloring until desired color is reached. (Note:The batter will darken upon baking.) Pour batter into prepared Springform pan. Place pan on a cookie sheet and bake at 275 degrees for about 1 1/4 hours or until center of cheesecake is firm.  Cool for 15 minutes and then run a knife around the edge of the Springform pan to loosen the cake from the sides. Cover and refrigerate for 4 hours. When read to serve, run a knife around the edge again and remove the Springform pan from the cheesecake. 

Decorating: Draw a template on parchment paper (see below) and place another piece of parchment over the template so you can make a few faces with icing or candy melts until you get the look desired. The icing is very fragile when dried, so you'll want to make them thick and let them dry completely, usually overnight. I placed a small fan on mine, overnight. If using candy melts, place in fridge to firm up. When completely dry, gently peel parchment back to release the face pieces, but be very careful, they will break if you move peel too quickly.  

After your face pieces are ready, cut the half moon shape out of your template and place the non-face side of your template on the cheesecake. Sprinkle black sugar crystals to the exposed cheesecake to create a dark side of the moon. Carefully remove the parchment template to reveal the black sugar half moon. Place your pieces onto your cheesecake to transform this basic cheesecake into a Halloween ready piece of art! Happy Halloween!

Other Halloween recipes to try:

My Bloody Valentine

Jack-o-lantern Cupcakes

Haunted Gingerbread House Cake Topper

Mini Caramel Cheesecakes

I love cheesecake but I really don't like to make cheesecake at home because it takes too long to bake. It takes over an hour usually and at two different temperatures, and it needs a special pan and some recipes call for it to bake in a water bath. And then after all that baking time and special handling, it needs to refrigerate for 12 hours. No, thank you. That's a long time to wait for dessert. Cheesecake is a fussy dessert, and who needs that kind of complication when you just want a bite of cheesecake.

Well, I've found the perfect recipe that you can make at home to satisfy your cheesecake craving that is decidedly, not fussy. In fact, these Mini Caramel Cheesecakes are as easy to make as cupcakes, they only take 15 minutes to bake and a little chill time in the fridge and they're done. Top them with your favorite sauce and you'll have a delicious and decadent dessert.

Mini Caramel Cheesecakes (adapted recipe from Betty Crocker)
Makes 12

1- 8oz package plus 3oz cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 eggs

Crust
1 cup graham cracker crumbs 
2 T sugar
1/4 cup butter, melted

Smucker's Caramel sauce
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Line muffin tin with paper baking cups. 

Beat cream cheese and sugar in a medium bowl until fluffy. Add vanilla and eggs one at a time. Set aside.
In a small bowl, mix graham cracker crumbs, sugar and melted butter until 
incorporated. Add about 1-2 Tablespoons of graham cracker mixture to the bottom of each baking cup. (I used a small cookie scoop) With the back of a small spoon, press and smooth out the crumbs so that it forms a crust. Fill cups three-fourths full.

Bake for 15 minutes. Cool for 20 minutes and then refrigerate for at least 2 hours. 

Remove the paper wrappers and top with some ready-made caramel sauce and serve along side fresh raspberries.

I had some Smucker's Caramel Sauce way in the back of the fridge leftover from our 'Make your own Sundae' day with my boys and decided to top these cheesecakes with it and wow they were amazing, but you can use chocolate or any topping you choose. 
Here's an idea for an easy fruit topping in a pinch, just heat up some blackberry, strawberry or raspberry jam for a beautiful fruit sauce topper. Enjoy!

Other dessert recipes to try:
Lemon Brownies
Orange Cornmeal Cake
Red Velvet Brownies with Cookie Crumble Frosting
Peanut Butter Poundcake with Chocolate Ganache
S'mores Cellar Cake

Cinnamon Cheesecake Cookies

I was panicked by the end of last week, because I hadn't spent any time cooking and as a result, I had nothing to blog about. It's Christmastime and I got nothing in the pipeline, nothing waiting to be written or pictures waiting to be reviewed and cropped. I was so ready for fall, so what happened to Christmas? ...the most wonderful time of the year...*sigh*
So...last weekend was catch up time. I made one of my easy dinners on Sunday and in addition to the easy main dish, I wanted to make something sweet and festive, like cookies. I perused my Pinterest pins, but nothing really jumped out at me. Then, I remembered the Cinnamon Cheesecake Cookies, I made last year for my neighbor's annual cookie exchange. My neighbor, Lily and her daughters host a cookie exchange each year and there are three categories to win, best presentation, most creative and best tasting. Last year, I was so excited that I won 'best tasting" for these little Cinnamon Cheesecake Cookies.  

The basic recipe came from from Heat Oven to 350 but I made a few changes to get to these delicious cookies. I omitted the fruit topping and added a cinnamon glaze, I also added cinnamon to the cookie dough and also added cinnamon graham crackers to the outside coating. They are so delicious, you won't believe all that yumminess comes from such a simple looking cookie. If you like cheesecake and sugar cookies and Snicker doodles, you'll love these soft, decadent cookies with a little bit of icing. Merry Christmas!

Cinnamon Cheesecake Cookies 
makes ~5 dozen

3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 t baking powder
1 t salt
1/4 t cinnamon
2 (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
2 1/2 sticks butter, softened
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 large eggs
2 t vanilla extract
1 cup cinnamon graham cracker crumbs

1 T Hershey's Cinnamon Chips 
1 1/2 T milk
1 cup powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Combine the flour, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon in a bowl. 
In another bowl with an electric mixer, beat cream cheese, butter and sugar until smooth and creamy, about 2 minutes. 
Add eggs and vanilla and mix until incorporated. 
Reduce speed to low and add the flour mixture and mix until just combined. Refrigerate dough until firm, at least 30 minutes.

Place one package of cinnamon graham crackers in a Ziplock bag and use a rolling pin to roll along the bag, crushing the crackers until they are uniform in size. Pour crumbs into a shallow dish. 

Prepare two baking sheets with parchment paper. 

Using a small cookie scoop, drop 1-inch rounds of the dough into the graham cracker crumbs and then roll the balls until covered with graham cracker crumbs. Place balls 2 inches apart on prepared baking sheets. Using the back of the spoon, slightly flatten the balls to ensure even cooking. Bake until golden brown around the edges, 12 to 14 minutes. Cool for five minutes on the sheet and then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

 

While cookies are cooling, prepare the icing. Placing the tablespoon of cinnamon chips and the 1 1/2 tablespoon of milk in a small microwavable bowl. Heat the milk and chips for 30 seconds. Remove from microwave and let sit for 1 minute and stir to melt the chips. Return to the microwave and repeat until chips are completely melted and smooth.  

Once melted, add the cinnamon chip and milk mixture to the cup of powdered sugar and mix until smooth. The mixture will not be runny. It will be the consistency of thick caramel. Add a 1/4 teaspoon of more milk if needed, but take care not to add too much milk. You don't want a runny icing that will melt and soak in to the cookie. 

Once the icing is prepared, use a spoon to drizzle icing in long strokes onto the cookies. Let icing set and then store cookies in an air tight container.
 

For other Christmas Cookie recipes see:
Gingerbread Biscotti 
Red Velvet Brownies with Cookie Crumble Frosting