Strawberry Filled Cheesecake

Strawberry Filled Cheesecake

Strawberry Filling

2 ½ C.    Strawberries (Frozen or fresh, whole or chopped)

½  C.       Sugar

2 ½ T.     Cornstarch

Stir to boiling and boil for 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Cool completely.

Crust

11 oz      Shortbread cookies (or graham crackers) finely crushed

3 T.         Butter melted

2 T.         Water

1 t.          Vanilla

Blend cookies until almost tasty, add rest of ingredients. Slightly grease a spring form pan. Put crust in pan and press 1 ¾ inch up the sides. Refrigerate for 15 minutes, bake for 10 minutes @ 350°. Reduce heat to 325°, melt 2 oz of semi sweet chocolate and spread on bottom of crust. Chill for 10 minutes.

Cream Cheese Mixture*

4 pkgs 8 oz          Cream cheese

1 ½ C.                    Sugar

4                              Eggs

2 t.                          Vanilla

Beat the cream cheese alone really good then add sugar and beat for a long time. Then add one egg at a time until blended, mix in vanilla. Place half of cream cheese mixture in pan and bake for 35 minutes at 325°. Remove from oven and cool for 20 minutes, then but the strawberry filling in the pan and bake for 15 minutes. Remove from oven and add the rest of the cream cheese mixture and bake for 50 minutes. (to prevent cracking try having a pan with water in the over and cracking the oven door just a tiny bit)

Cool completely then remove sides of spring form pan. Garnish with chocolate striped across the top and serve with white chocolate dipped strawberries. Store in refrigerator.

*Note: the spring form pan I have was a little small for this recipe, it fit but almost when over the top while cooking. To prevent this the next time I just 3/4ed the cream cheese mixture and reduce cook time by 5 minutes in each step during the cream cheese part. Turned out great.

Plain Cheese Cake

Follow above recipe, omit strawberry filling and cook entire cream cheese mixture in the crust for 1 hour at 325°.