Friday, March 2, 2012

Cheesecakes in a Jar

I've been very into the concept of baking things into jars lately, because it makes cleanup and storage so much easier, and it looks pretty cute. I tried it out today for the first time with cheesecake, and I recommend it!
Here is the recipe:

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups of crushed graham crackers
1/4 cup of sugar
1/4 cup of melted butter
3 8oz packages of cream cheese, softened
1 14oz can of sweetened condensed milk
3 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
some mason jars, whatever size you like. (the batter makes enough to fill about 8 pint sized jars.)

First, crush your graham crackers. I find it's easiest to crumble them a bit by hand into a big ziplock bag, then crush them by rolling a rolling pin over the bag. Combine the crushed graham crackers with the sugar and melted butter, then press into the bottom of each jar. I ended up with a layer about 1/4 inch thick, but you can use as much as you want. Save some of the graham cracker crust mixture for the top of the cheesecakes, if you like.
Next, make the cheesecake batter! Start by blending the cream cheese until it is fluffy, then slowly blend in the sweetened condensed milk until the mixture is smooth and creamy. Add the eggs and vanilla, then blend again.
Spoon the batter into the jars, but don't fill all the way to the top. At this point, I added some more of the graham cracker crumble to the top.
Put the jars into a fairly deep baking dish, then fill the baking dish with boiling water, until the jars are submerged about halfway. It's a cheesecake bath! Put the whole mess into the oven, at 350 degrees, and bake for around 25 minutes. You may have to adjust this time depending on what size jars you're using. Mine were half pint sized, and 25 minutes was just right. You want the cheesecake to still jiggle a little bit, but have inflated a bit on the top. Carefully remove the pan, and pop the jars into the fridge, until they're cold and delicious! If you're not a cheesecake purist, you can top them with berries, sauce, chocolate chips, or whatever your heart desires.

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