Something Fruity!

Yes. It's fruit time in Tennessee - well, at least for me and my fellow friends in my apartment.  My dear friend, Alicia, and I have been talking about making some sort of fruit pizza (in order to start the process of me obtaining baking skills), but it slowly turned into a cheesecake rendition of this classic dessert, and even a rendition of a classic cheesecake.  We walked around Kroger Marketplace, finding fresh fruits that would beautifully top this devine decadence.

We started with a store bought (yes, I know) sugar cookie dough put into a small baking pan, and then made some cheesecake filling with 1/3 fat cream cheese and fat free cream cheese, along with sugar, vanilla, eggs, and lime zest.  We baked those two together, and topped them with a sour cream, lime yogurt, sugar, and lime zest topping and then baking a few minutes longer.  Then we topped it with yummy fruits - raspberries, strawberries, blackberries, red plums, fresh cherries, and kiwi.  It was a sweet, tart, and tangy dessert, with a cheesecakey-sugary-chewy-cakey-yummy bottom :) ('Cause you know how we like our bottoms around here, huh?!)

Fruity Lime Cheesecake Pizza
Ingredients
1 sugar cookie dough package
Lots and lots of fresh fruit!!!
Filling
1 1/2 packages of 1/3 fat, fat free, or combo cream cheese
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp lime zest
2 eggs
Topping
1 small cup Weight Watchers Key Lime yogurt (or equivalent size)
1 small (8 oz) cup fat free sour cream
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp lime zest
1/4 cup sugar

Preheat oven to 350ºF.
In a small baking pan (I think mine is like... a 6x12 or something... some really random size), flatten out the raw cookie dough.
Mix all of the filling ingredients in a bowl until smooth.  Pour over top of the cookie dough. Bake for about 30-40 minutes (until the cheesecake is ALMOST cooked all the way through).  Remove and leave oven on.
While the cheesecake is cooking, mix all of the topping ingredients together.  Refrigerate until the cheesecake is finished.
Once the cheesecake is finished, top it with the topping. You want a thin layer, so you may not need it all.  Bake it for about 8 more minutes (Until the topping is no longer runny).
Let the cheesecake cool for about 40+ minutes, until it is cool on the top.  Then add your fresh fruit!!

Chill for at least another hour before you cut the cheesecake.

Um. Hello? Doesn't this look devine?!

It was so much fun to try this - we were all skeptical just because of my infamous baking skills. And of course I didn't follow a recipe (and yes, my cheesecake did fall, but I easily hid that with lots and lots of fruit!).  But regardless, the mixture was fantastic - the lime was tangy, the sugar..well...sugary sweet, and the fruit was a mixture of sweet and barely-ripe-tartness.  Team this with a little mint water (because it will make you thirsty!) and you're in for a good treat.  We even laughed a little at my roommate/friend's boyfriend, Phil, for gobbling up the rest of her (yes, her, because he didn't want his own) piece without even taking a breath - that usually means it's good, right?!

Ciao e bella cucina!
Katherine

Chillin' Out at Chill Custom Creamery

I wanted to do a post about my workplace, Chill Custom Creamery, where we make ice cream with liquid nitrogen.  And I decided to make an ice cream and talk about it!
Chill Custom Creamery (Chill) is a locally owned, operated, and engineered ice cream store in Knoxville, TN.  The concept is a little different, and it is how we get our "Custom Creamery" part of our name. When you first come in, you get to choose a liquid base to start off with; currently we have: vanilla ice cream, chocolate ice cream, soy base, dark chocolate frozen yogurt, nonfat vanilla frozen yogurt, or a pink lemonade sorbet.  After you choose a base, you get to choose if you'd like a flavor added to your ice cream. We have many different kinds of flavors to add in, some being: peanut butter, caramel, marshmallow cream, coconut, orange cream, pistachio, and almond.  Then you take your base and add in mix-ins, ranging from fruits to nuts to candy bars, we have almost anything you could think of. Then the fun really begins :)
The staff, also known as "Chillers," will take the mixture and freeze it on the spot! We freeze it with liquid nitrogen in kitchen aides, and the system is locally engineered! It's pretty awesome stuff.
When you get the ice cream, you will be surprised to find that it is a completely different texture than hardserve or soft-serve ice cream. And there's a reason.  Although it looks as if you're going to eat a gallon of liquid nitrogen, it isn't true!  When we add the liquid nitrogen, it boils at room temperature and it creates a creamier, thicker ice cream. It's so yummy.
What also adds to the experience is we make our own vanilla and chocolate ice cream in the store (nearly every day, a job that I have been happy to be in charge of every shift I come in).  The ice cream is rich, creamy, and full of flavor! As long as you don't over do it with your mix-ins and flavors, you will get to experience something new and taste some of the best ice cream you will ever have.

So today I wanted to make a strawberry-lemonade ice cream with a hint of coconut and it turned out okay.  I wasn't really impressed with the flavor of the lemon that we had (so I'm going to bring in my own lemon next time :D), but I was happy with the mixture of coconut, lemon, and strawberry! It should inspire me to make some sort of dessert at home, eh?? We'll see!!

I'm off to Myrtle Beach for the week and I am thinking about doing a "food review" of my trip. So we'll see what comes of it!

Easy Raspberry Chocolates with White Chocolate Drizzle

So after a failed attempt to make raspberry sorbet filled chocolate, I decided to just throw in the sorbet (literally)! I'm not a dessert person, so this is my sad attempt to make something sweet and yummy! Let's hope I develop my skills over the summer.

Ingredients:
1/2 pint (8 oz) raspberry sorbet
2 packages (16 oz) semi-sweet baker's chocolate
2 oz white baker's chocolate

Directions:
Have a cookie sheet wrapped with wax paper prepared. And make some space in the freezer!
Have a melon baller handy :)
Fill a large sauce pan with about 2 inches of water and place on the stove on medium heat. Find a large glass (or heat resistant) bowl to place over the water (where you will melt the chocolate). Chop the chocolate into smalle squares and add into the glass bowl. Continuously stir as the chocolate will begin to melt quickly. If the chocolate heats too quickly, turn the heat down. Once the chocolate has all melted, add in the sorbet, a little bit at a time, to melt into the chocolate. Don't add it too quickly!
Once all the sorbet is added, continuously stir as you "ball out" each serving of chocolate. I just formed small little circles with a small melon baller size. Stick them in the freezer for at least 2 hours, or until the chocolate is no longer liquid.
You can melt the 2 oz of white chocolate in the microwave according to directions; it took about 1 1/2 minutes in my microwave. With the same spoon you stir with, drizzle the white chocolate liberally over the circles. I moved the circles closer together so it would be easier to drizzle. I ate a couple on the way, and they are a soft consistency! Yummy, and not what I expected!