Mascarpone & Cream Cheese Cheesecake

I love making cheesecakes, especially in the style of Junior's New York cheesecake (my favorite!), but this time I wanted to try something new. I wanted to find a new recipe that took less time and fewer ingredients. The recipe I usually use requires heavy whipping cream, which is quite expensive and makes another trip to the store. I adapted this recipe I found from Food Network: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/mascarpone-cheesecake-with-almond-crust-recipe.html. It's delicious!

Ingredients:

1 packet graham crackers

3 tbsp sugar

1 tbsp butter, melted

8 oz (1 package) cream cheese

8 oz mascarpone cheese (1 package of BelGioioso)

.625 cup sugar

1 tsp lemon juice

1/2 tsp vanilla extract or licor

2 eggs, room temperature

How to Make:

1. Blend graham crackers, sugar, and melted butter for the crust. Shape crust into pan. Bake in 325 degree oven for 10 minutes.

2. In a mixer, mix the cream cheese and sugar.

3. Add the lemon juice and vanilla extract.

4. Once mixture is well blended, add the eggs.

5. Pour mixture into prepared crust pan.

6. For mini cheesecakes, bake in 325 degree oven for 25 minutes. Let cool in oven before taking it out and putting it in the refrigerator.

Strawberry Jam (made with local strawberries!)

Strawberry season in my town starts early April, and there are a few strawberry stands that sell daily-picked strawberries. The local strawberries are truly the sweetest strawberries that I've ever tasted. The strawberries you get at grocery stores are not very sweet, and sometimes are super tart, as they are chilled and delivery time takes longer. The best time of day to get the strawberries are in the morning, when the fruit is still moist, and the hot sun is away, and also to beat the crowd-- sometimes the strawberries are all sold out (and you feel like such a lazy person for not waking up at 7 am when the stands open, just for strawberries)! Anyways, my obsession with strawberries and buying $11 worth of six pints of strawberries ended up with I eating too many strawberries and getting the stomach bug (too much acidity in the stomach, maybe?)- at least I made jam during that time of obsession, and here is what I have to rave about these strawberries:

Ingredients: (from the Sure-Jell recipe, makes four 8-oz. jars)

2.5 cups strawberries, pureed
3.5 cups sugar
1.75 tbsp pectin

How to Make:

1. Wash and peel stems off strawberries. Puree the strawberries in a blender.

2. Pour the puree into a nonstick saucepan on medium heat.
3. Add 1.75 tbsp of pectin to the mixture, and bring to a boil.

4. When the mixture is in a rolling boil, add the sugar, stirring constantly.

5. Once mixture returns to a boil for one minute, remove from heat.

 

6. Pour the mixture immediately into sterilized hot canning jars.

7. Seal the jars, and place them in a hot water bath canner. Boil the jars for 10-15 minutes, depending on the altitude at your location. Remove from heat and let cool.

Peach Butter

This year's peach harvest yielded many, many peaches. So many peaches that we were running out of ideas to make use of them. It's difficult to store peaches too, as they get mushy very easily whether stored in the refrigerator or left unpicked on the tree. And those peaches ripe so fast and at the same time! Usually 75% of them are ripe by the beginning of July, and we have to harvest them all during continuous 90+ degree hot days. My sister searched some ideas, and one particularly interesting idea was making peach butter. I've tasted apple butter before, but peach butter! This was sure something interesting to try, as I've gotten so bored of making peach jam. I used up 27 whole ripe peaches for two batches of peach butter. It was sure a fun-filled cooking adventure with my sister (who made peach BBQ sauce) on the Fourth of July.

Ingredients: (makes 4 cups of peach butter)
18 peaches
2 cinnamon sticks (1 tbsp ground cinnamon)
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
2 cups sugar

How to make:
1. Wash and cut an 'X' (this will make it easier to remove the skin) on the peaches, and soak them in hot water. Place in ice water bath and remove the skin. Dice peaches and place into a blender.

2. Puree the peaches in a blender. For ultra smooth peach butter, you can process the peaches longer.

3. Pour the peach puree into a nonstick pan on medium heat.

4. Add the cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and sugar.

5. Cover pan slightly with the lid so that steam can get out. Boil the mixture on medium heat for 30-40 minutes, until the mixture reduces in volume by one-half.

6. Pour the mixture into sterilized glass jars for canning.
7. Seal the jars and place back into a water bath canner for 5-10 minutes for processing.
8. Remove from heat and let cool.