Lemon Cheesecake

Ingredients:

• 4 blocks of cream cheese (8 oz. each), softened
• 4 eggs
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 1 1/2 cup sweetening material:
  (for low carb, I use either 1 1/2 cup Splenda, or I mix half Splenda and half erythritol — using 3/4 cup of each)
  (for non low carb, you could use 1 1/2 c. sugar. Suit yourself.)
  To make it lemon, use 1 tsp. lemon extract or juice of one lemon and 1 tsp. lemon zest.

In the cheesecake pictured above, I ground up sugar-free Oreos and used them for a crust. It was okay, but not fabulous. Probably a waste of carbs to do the crust and the cheesecake is fabulous without them.

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Allow your cream cheese to soften. In the meantime, if you are making the lemon version, use a micro plane or lemon zester to get your lemon zest (fancy word for the peel, but remember to avoid getting into the white part — it’s bitter!).

Squeeze your lemon whatever way suits you. This citrus juicer works great, but if you have strong hands you can avoid dirtying a kitchen tool. Just squeeze. Be sure you hunt out and discard any seeds. If you’re doing an Oreo crust, throw about 8 Oreos into the mini food processor.

Grind up the cookies and pour and press them into a springform pan. Be sure to encircle the bottom seam of the springform pan with foil to avoid leakage. Again, I want to stress that the crust is entirely optional. After doing it once, I’ve not done it again. Beat your eggs with the sweetener/sugar and vanilla just until well-blended. Add the cream cheese. Beat with an electric mixer at medium speed until smooth. Pour into the springform pan.

Bake at 350 degrees for approximately 40 minutes. Allow to cool. Remove the springform.

See the cheesecake pictured at the top? Now look at the slice of cheesecake pictured at the bottom. There are two big differences. The one at the bottom doesn’t have a crust. More importantly, the one at the bottom was baked in a water bath That made it creamy and made it rise more. To do a water bath, place your foil wrapped spring form pan into a deeper baking dish, then pour hot water into the deep pan on the outside of the springform pan.
Get it deep enough so that it’s about the height of your batter. Be really careful putting the pan into the oven and taking it out. Doesn’t this look yummy?