cream-cheese | Pamela Toman

Ingredients	Step
	Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
½ lb. butter, softened 8 oz cream cheese, softened 1 T. sugar 1 T. milk	Cream together.
1 egg yolk	Add. Mix in.
2 c. cake flour ½ t. baking powder	Whisk together, then add to wet ingredients.
	Chill 2 hours or overnight.
2 cans Solo pie filling (e.g., prune, apricot)	Take a baseball sized ball of batter. Roll it out using cake flour. Cut it into squares, then place the squares onto ungreased cookie sheets. Dab on filling, then fold up the two side corners of each cookie. Bake 10-12 minutes.
powdered sugar	When cool (or after freezing then thawing cookies), sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Plain Cheesecake

A 9" cheesecake. You must make it the day before so it has time to set up -- but it's a nice dense cheesecake in the Eli's style.

The tricks to non-cracking cheesecake: use room temperature ingredients, introduce minimal air, don't overbeat your eggs, keep a stable oven temperature (no peeking!), free the crust from the pan, and cool the cheesecake slowly.

Springform pans will work, but they may leak -- you may want a dedicated cheesecake pan if you make this often.

For a vegan cheesecake, the Daiya brand New York Cheezecake comes highly recommended (yes, truly, Daiya).

Ingredients	Step
32 oz (4 containers) cream cheese ⅔ c. sour cream 4 large eggs	Pull out and let rise to room temperature.
	Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Ensure the rack is in the center of the oven.
1½ c. graham cracker crumbs (1 package) 2 T. white sugar 1 T. brown sugar 7 T. melted butter	Combine (probably in the food processor), then press into a 9" round pan. Place the pan on a cookie sheet lined with foil (just in case).
32 oz cream cheese	Stir gently until smooth and creamy, scraping as needed.
1 c. sugar	Stir gently again until creamy, scraping as needed.
⅔ c. sour cream 1½ t. vanilla ⅛ t. salt	Stir until well-combined, scraping as needed.
4 eggs	One at a time, lightly beat each egg and then gently stir into the cream cheese mixture. Do not over-mix. Scrape sides as needed.
	Tap the cheesecake batter against the counter until you're satisfied that you've eliminated most of the air bubbles you introduced during mixing.
	Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake at 325 for 50-75 minutes, until the edges are slightly puffed and possibly turning light golden brown, and the center is still jiggly like Jell-O.
	Turn off the oven and open it, letting it cool for 10 minutes. After ten minutes, use a knife to gently loosen the crust from the pan -- but leave the ring attached.
	Let the cheesecake cool until it is near room temperature (1-2 hours), then refrigerate the cheesecake overnight before serving.

Source: Sam Merritt

Wool Roll

I keep making this one. It's so pretty...

It takes 4-5 hours start-to-finish.

Sometimes the bread filling gets a chemical flavor, and I suspect it's the cream cheese. Next time I make this bread, I want to try a savory filling that I know will bake well to check this flavor source hypothesis. Getting a higher end cream cheese that isn't stretched with filler might also help.

Other filling ideas: use jam instead of freeze-dried fruit; cinnamon/sugar/butter/raisin; coconut/cream cheese/chocolate chip; Nutella/cream cheese; garlic butter; onion/garlic/sundried tomato; basil/garlic/parmesan; hatch chilis/Colby Jack

Ingredients	Step
3 T. water 3 T. milk, whole preferred 2 T. bread flour	Combine in a small saucepan. Whisk until lump-free. Then cook over medium heat, stirring, until thickened and paste-like (~2-4 minutes).
tangzhong ½ c. milk	Transfer tangzhong to the bowl of the stand mixer. Stir milk on top to help cool it.
2½ c. (300 g) bread flour (often I need to add more) 1 egg 4 T. butter, softened 1 T. (9 g) yeast ¼ c. (50 g) sugar 1 t. (6 g) salt	Mix to combine, then knead until soft & smooth (tackier than a post-it, sticking somewhat to the walls of the mixing bowl, but not a batter and not sticking to oiled hands).
lightly greased bowl	Shape the dough into a ball. Let it rest in a lightly greased bowl, covered, for 1-1½ hours, until puffy. It won't necessarily double.
4 oz. cream cheese (half package), at warm room temperature 2 T. sugar zest of 2 lemons pinch of salt	Mix until smooth.
2 T. freeze-dried fruit 2 T. flour	Mix until berries are completely crushed and evenly distributed.
	On a lightly floured surface, gently deflate the dough. Divide it into 4 pieces (~170 g. each). Shape each into a ball. Cover and let rest 10 minutes.
9" springform or round pan	Line with parchment. Lightly grease the parchment and sides of pan.
	Working with one piece of dough at a time, roll it into a 6"x12" rectangle. Portion ¼ of the filling (2 heaping tablespoons) onto the top half of the rectangle. Spread it down, leaving the last 5"-6" bare. Cut the uncovered dough into very thin strips. Fold the long edges in so the filling can't seep out; pat gently to flatten. Roll toward the uncovered strips, lightly press the strips into the log, then place the log (seam-side down) into the pan along the outside edge. Repeat.
	Cover and let rise 60-75 minutes.
	Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
milk	Brush the roll with milk (be careful not to deflate it). Bake 28-32 minutes, rotating partway through, until 190 degrees and golden. Remove and cool on rack.

Source: Molly Marzalek-Kelly from King Arthur Flour

Pamela Toman

Tag: cream-cheese

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Plain Cheesecake

Wool Roll

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