Cream Cheese

It has become a tradition in my house that I make everyone’s favorite dessert on his or her birthday. Garth’s favorite is German Chocolate Cake, Taylor’s is Banana Pudding, and so on. When it came time for my friend Joe’s birthday, his wife, Kim, let me know that his favorite was cheesecake. “No problem,” I said, as I started thinking about that awesome cheesecake in a box I was going to make (I have to admit that it’s my favorite). “He loves the old-style New York cheesecake,” she explained. Umm … no problem? But I was committed, so I did what I always do: call my family for help. Beth hooked me up with several cheesecake recipes, and this is the one I like best. It made me a big hit on Joe’s birthday.

We seem to place a lot of emphasis on birthday cakes in my family. We like for everyone to have his or her favorite cake, but more than that, we like the variety of awesome sweets we get to eat throughout the year! This cake was once Beth’s birthday cake of choice—or so Mom thought until she learned that Beth actually preferred the chocolate caramel cake I always ask for. At first, I thought she was just trying to copy me (it’s a sister thing!), but then I realized that if it’s her favorite cake, too, that’s twice a year for me!

My sister Beth’s sister-in-law, Margaret, makes this salad, and it’s a nice alternative to plain cranberry sauce for holiday meals. In fact, it’s rich enough to serve as a dessert!

We always made this to take to Family Night suppers at church. Its official name was Congealed Fruit Salad, but it was known at our house as pink salad, because, well, it’s pink! Besides, anything with the word congealed in the title just sounds gross to me, and this is anything but.

This is my sister’s go-to appetizer for church socials, Super Bowl Sundays, and Christmas munchies. Several years ago, she put too much of the ranch dressing mix into the recipe, and it was hard to serve. My dad renamed it the “cheese wad.” We think Ranch Dressing Cheese Ball sounds more appetizing, but at our house, it will forever be known as Cheese Wad!

This recipe is from a trip that Fred took with Allison and her parents to the Czech Republic: “I was thirty, traveling in the back of an Opel minivan loaded with adults. The bottles of beer were always too small and the stops never frequent enough. This was back when I was ignoring a little gluten issue and drinking vast quantities of Czechvar/Budvar. Basically, this trip was like the Griswolds in Prague. “While visiting an old brewery’s beer garden, I noticed a ‘little things to eat with beer’ section of the menu. It was full of pickled herring, utopenec (pickled sausage), and cheese. We ordered them all, and when the cheese arrived, it was like a gathering of all of the cheese leftovers blended with beer. It was unsightly and completely delicious.” You will need four (4-ounce) cheese molds with holes or four Styrofoam coffee cups with holes poked in the bottoms and sides, plus four paper coffee filters to make the cheese.

Don't let the good looks of this eight-layer beauty fool you; it's easy to make. Bake 4 cakes (we used 9" round metal cake pans, but disposable ones work fine), then slice each in half. Finish with toasted coconut, a knockout garnish that's also forgiving— it'll mask a less-than-perfect frosting job.

Editor's note: Chef Donald Link of New Orleans restaurants Cochon and Herbsaint, shared this recipe as part of a special Mardi Gras celebration he created for Epicurious. Chocolate Yummy might not be part of your dessert vernacular, but in Cajun Country, everybody knows what this dish is. The "yummy" architecture begins with a base of crumbled cookies (usually store-bought), followed by layers of sweetened cream cheese, chocolate pudding, and Cool Whip. I have a few aunts who specialize in this dessert, so it never fails to conjure up memories of family get-togethers. This is the type of dessert that someone pulls out of the fridge after a big meal or cookout, and even when guests think they're too full, they find themselves polishing off a portion of yummy.
Here is a grown-up version that's a bit more sophisticated, because I have lost my taste for the super-sweet original. Here, a rich pecan shortbread base is topped with cream cheese, a silky pudding made with dark chocolate, and fresh whipped cream. I'm pretty sure it would even win my aunts' approval.

Imagine taking a bite of the edge of a cheesecake, with a chunky piece of crust on your fork and a thin layer of the sweet-and-sour cream cheese filling gracing the crust. Now imagine having that flavor in a bite-size version that you can pop into your mouth by hand. These sandwich cookies are like mini inverted cheesecakes (by “inverted” I mean more crust than filling). The cream cheese icing, which adds a tanginess to the cookie, can be made with or without cinnamon. The sugar in the cream cheese icing acts as a natural preservant, so the cookies can be left at room temperature in an airtight container for a week.

The mint element of these brownies is incorporated differently from the way the peanut butter was in the previous recipe. Mint extract is added to the base brownie batter and then an additional mint cream layer is made, using a batter similar to cheesecake. The cream cheese layer requires the brownies to be cooked for longer at a lower temperature. The resulting dessert has a rich texture but a somewhat less intense chocolate flavor than the other brownie recipes. The sour tang of the cream cheese also tempers the sweetness of this treat.

This is another great example of turning the flavors you like from a raditional dessert into a more modern form. Imagine the elements of tiramisù—ladyfingers, ricotta pastry cream, cinnamon, and coffee liqueur—and figure out the components of a cupcake that will best match up with those flavors. Then, voilà!, you have a new kind of cupcake. We assemble this cupcake without alcohol, but feel free to substitute Kahlúa or another coffee liqueur for the espresso (or in addition to the espresso) to give this dessert an extra punch.

In this icing, the acidity of the citrus enhances the tanginess of the cream cheese. Orange, lemon, and lime all work well. Although the orange icing is my favorite, lemon is especially flavorful with fruity vanilla cakes, such as the Blueberry “Cheesecake” (page 123), and the lime icing spread over a vanilla cupcake and sprinkled with graham cracker crumbs, or sandwiched between two homemade graham crackers (see Graham Cracker Dough, page 86), can evoke a Key lime pie.

Cream Cheese Icing is a less sweet alternative to the Vanilla Icing (page 136), but it’s not quite as fussy as the Swiss Buttercream (page 155), making it suitable for a Father’s Day dinner or for entertaining your boss. It is also the only icing that pairs well with all the cake flavors in this book, as well as being a great filling for sandwich cookies—particularly graham crackers (see Graham Cracker Dough, page 86). (Please note: It is important that the butter and cream cheese are both at room temperature when they are mixed, or they will not fully incorporate.)

Admittedly, the depth of flavor of the Chocolate Icing can overwhelm some cakes. Cutting that intensity with the Cream Cheese Icing helps balance the cake and icing without compromising the flavor of the chocolate. I find the need for balance especially true with the Banana Cake (page 126). When you serve it with this Chocolate Cream Cheese Icing, you have the subtle chocolate taste, but you still get to showcase the banana.

This cheesecake-like tart has a crust made from ground vanilla wafers rather than the standard graham crackers. The top of the tart might brown irregularly; conceal any spots by dusting the surface lightly with confectioners’ sugar (use a fine-mesh sieve).

To save time, you can make this recipe with store-bought pie dough; look for refrigerated dough (not frozen piecrusts) made with butter rather than margarine or partially hydrogenated oils.

Serve this rich, velvety dip with crostini (page 365), breadsticks, or crackers. Or try it as a delectable accompaniment for roast chicken or pork.

A mixture of jam and cream cheese produces a pleasantly creamy and not-too-sweet filling. Feel free to swap other flavors of jam for the apricot used here, or fresh berries for the tropical fruit salad.

PARSNIPS HAVE A DEEPER, MORE SOULFUL FLAVOR than carrots, and this hearty root vegetable takes center stage in our version of a carrot cake. Sweet and spiced with ginger and cloves, this moist cake makes a great birthday cake or anytime cake.