Lemon Souffle Cheesecake, The Complete Baking Cookbook "Winner" and Yet Another Confession

Before I make yet another "confession" that makes me, yet again, a hypocrite -- not a hypocrite once simply because it always seems that my confessions are hiss-pered declarations of actually liking something that I had previously so vehemently denounced as hateful, but a hypocrite doubly deep because I just argued that "confession" shouldn't even exist as a concept and here I am *ahem* confessing -- before I go and do the very thing that I could just, you know, not do, let's pick the very first winner of the very first gift in The Delicious Life Birthday Month Cookbook-a-Day Giftaway.

Because, you know, this is a fantastic way to put off hypocrisy!

Mis amigos, the randomly chosen recipient of The Complete Baking Cookbook is...

Liz of A Mom's Insanity!

Liz, when the asylum people "release" you from that stunning fitted white wraparound jacket with the corset-tight straps, buckles and strangely long sleeves without holes, send me an email with your mailing address so I can send you your Delicious Birthday gift. Bake something from it! Write about it! Take pictures of you posing with it in just an apron and nothing else (apron on the book, not you - don't you have kids?!).

Happy birthday to me, from me to you!

Now let's revisit that "confession."

Lemon Souffle Cheesecake
from The Complete Baking Cookbook
Serves 10 to 12

Crust
1½ cups butter cookie crumbs
¼ cup unsalted butter, melted

Filling
4 packages (8 oz each) cream cheese, softened
½ cup sour cream
4 egg yolks
1 Tbsp fresjly grated lemon zest
3 Tbsp Freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 ½ tsp vanilla extract
6 egg whites
¼ tsp cream of tartar

Decoration
¼ cup confectioner’s sugar

Preheat oven to 325

1. Crust: In a bowl, combine cookie crumbs and butter. Press into bottom of cheesecake pan and freeze

2. Filling: In a mixer bowl fited with paddle attachment, beat cream cheese, sour cream and sugar until very smooth, for 3 minutes. Addegg yolks, one at a time, beating after each addition. Beat in lemon zest, juice and vanilla. Set aside. In a clean mixer bowl fitted with whip attachment, whip egg whites and cream of tartar on low speed until stiff peaks form, but not dry. Fold into cream cheese mixture carefully so as not to deflate the mixture.

3. Pour over frozen crust, smoothing out to sides of pan. Bake in preheated oven until top is light brown and center has a slight jiggle to it, 45 to 55 minutes. Let cool on wire rack for 2 hours. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 6 hours before decorating or serving.

4. Decoration: Dust top of chilled cake with a sprinkling of confectioner’s sugar using a sugar dredger or flour sifter.

tags :: food : and drink : cooking : baking : american : desserts : recipes : cookbooks : birthdays : reviews : los angeles