Honey-Flaxseed Rye Crispbread from The Rye Baker. Better than any crispbread you’ll get from that Swedish furniture store or any other purveyor. A little tangy, a little sweet, very crunchy. I modified the recipe to make it 100% sourdough with no other leaveners. Very addictive and now more fun to make, thanks to the recent acquisition of a proper kruskavel (deep notched rolling pin).
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Very inspiring!
Was just trying out Stella Parks’ cheesecake after letting it chill overnight.
I made a half recipe and cut down the sugar from 7 oz to 6, as in my experience the amount of cheese called for doesn’t need that much sugar, and both a taste of the batter and the final product proved me right. I used my 6x3 pan and that’s the height I like for a cheesecake. I once made Stella’s no-bake cheesecake in a 4-inch tall pan as she called for and I honestly didn’t like such a tall slice.
What I like about Stella’s recipe is she cuts through a lot of the nonsense that plagues cheesecake recipes. I have always been a proponent of low temperature baking and doing away with the water bath altogether when it comes to cheesecakes. The water bath is unnecessary and annoying. And speaking of unnecessary, the first thing I look for applies here: NO FLOUR/STARCH in the batter.
She also has you actually bake the cheesecake. Too many recipes for cheesecake have you doing an almost mystical process where you put the cheesecake in, bake it for an exact amount of time, then don’t open the oven and just shut off the heat and hope in the end when you’re allowed to open it that it’s fine. From the same recipe writers who will warn that every oven is different when you’re making something like a cake or cookie 
. No, just bake to 150 (Stella says 145 but I prefer 150) at which point the outer rim of the cheesecake is set while the center is still decently jiggly.
This cheesecake bakes up beautifully with zero issues. Not a crack in sight and ultra smooth. The graham crust doesn’t get par-baked and doesn’t contain a ton of butter and it works perfectly. I also like that it isn’t sweetened. Graham crackers are already sweet enough, so I typically don’t add sugar to them when doing a crust.
The thing is I’m not sure I’m in love with the final product. I had completely forgotten about the goat cheese and then on first bite I thought “oh, goat cheese”. In subsequent bites I wasn’t really detecting the goat cheese flavor to the same extent, though. It is definitely there, in spite of claims that it’s not detectable, but it’s faint. I’m not sure what’s missing for me here as it’s certainly ultra creamy, not overly sweet, and rich without being too heavy. It might be that I think it could be a bit tangier still.
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Curious - once it’s getting close, do you just stick a thermapen in the center to check temps? I’ve never thought about checking temp on cheesecake (instead I’ve always followed The Mystics in their advice as you described).
Yes. It leaves a small hole (or belly button as Stella calls it), but nothing that bothers me, and with a topping it’s a non-issue. Since I only bake cheesecake once in a blue moon due to how rich and extravagant a whole one feels, I like to check even though I have a decent sense for when it’s got the correct amount of jiggle.
You can see it in this cheesecake video, too:
(Though not my favorite method at least she has you make sure the cheesecake is at 150 BEFORE shutting off the oven; she’s missing that if you lower the temperature at which you bake, water bath is completely unnecessary, both in terms of over-baking and also the aesthetic stuff like the color)
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I really want to try this one. I think it would be good with the local queso crema as a substitute for the ricotta. It’s like a well-drained ricotta, albeit completely unsalted.
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This is a great recipe for sourdough beginners because you don’t have to worry about loft. It’s a bit of a sticky, yet firm, dough to mix.The recipe calls for a flat beater, but no way is this dough soft enough for that, so I use a dough hook and scrape the bowl down a lot. With a well-floured surface, it’s very easy to roll out thinly. I baked mine for 8 minutes at 425f, which seemed to be sufficient. The kruskavel gets used after the dough is rolled out with a regular pin, to give it texture and prevent unwanted rising. It’s fun to roll it across the dough, making a rrrrript, rrrript sound as you use it. I just really like this stuff. We always had crispbread in the house when I was little and it’s nice to break off a bit and crunch it plain or with sweet or savoury toppings.
In short, it looks more impressive than it is and tastes good.
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Thank you so much for the details! I have no fear of sourdough, and have been passively studying options for making knackebrod for some time. It’s one of my favorite crackers. Given your good results and encouragement, I’ve put everything on my Christmas wishlist (book, rolling pin, spelt), and I’m pretty sure Santa is warm to the idea of gifting me a hands-on learning project this year. 
I’ve printed out your notes and comments.
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You’ll enjoy this book. If you buy your flour, rather than freshly mill it, the timing and moisture content of the recipes should be just right. I’ve had to really adjust some things because I freshly mill all of my flours except the white sifted wheat ones, like bread and pastry. My little countertop Komo XL has done an excellent job for quite a few years now and gets used a lot. It has been a good investment.
The rolling pin does what it’s supposed to and, lets face it, is a fun bit of kit that will put a smile on your face. Also good for home security. 
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You’re my idol…
https://joepastry.com/2010/how_to_make_new_york_style_cheesecake/
I baked this cheesecake and here I absolutely love the tang of the sour cream. I’ll point out that Stella’s cheesecake got better and better the more I tasted of it, but a cheesecake like this tastes perfectly calibrated for me on first bite. It’s also more economical by far since the bulk of it is sour cream.
I added a crust to this, but because this mix is so liquid I think it’s easier to add a crust post-bake the way Joe does.
Though I hate water baths for cheesecake I went with it here because there is one advantage to them: they’re faster. Still this took longer for me than Joe stated, and I cooked it to 160°. But I was baking in the evening and that tends to cause problems in terms of the oven heating properly due to the power being weak. I’d bake this to at least 165 because it’s much looser than a standard cheesecake and at 150 it was still very liquid. CI bakes their NY cheesecake to 165 and that one is almost all cream cheese with only a tiny bit of sour cream.
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Today’s breakfast scone is lemon-blueberry with dried berries. Another mini-batch, I’m using this NYT recipe as the standard, subbing soaked, non-alcoholic fruit for the brandied fruit. Today’s modification included a few extra lamination folds beyond my typical, and whipping the cream before mixing it in. The result was a better rise.
FYI the original version of this recipe, with the brandied fruit, is one of my all-time favorite scone recipes (just a bit decadent for everyday eating).
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LOL! I’m just forgetful and try to be thrifty. Whole grains last for years without going stale and they’re much less expensive than the premlled flour, especially if you get them in bulk. The fresh stuff just tastes really good. Apart from the mill, there is also a grain flaker attachment for the mixer. The freshly flaked oats are a world apart from predone. Granola and oatmeal cookies are next level delicious.
The tired and cranky-looking kind you place above the door to scare intruders? Ok, I’ll go with that.
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It all sounds so good (the milling, flaked oats, etc.)!
As you like cheesecake, have you made Alice Medrich’s labne tart.
It’s delicious and is similar to cheesecake.
https://food52.com/recipes/21482-alice-medrich-s-labneh-lebni-labni-tart/amp
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Yes, it’s one of my favorite desserts!
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I made a mini-batch of Recipe Tin Eats’ parmesan shortbread crisps (along with a big pot of garden tomato soup).
The light and puffy crackers are just 3 ingredients – almost equal parts butter, flour and parmesan cheese. Next time I’ll add a pinch of salt, and possibly a pinch of cayenne. An easy, savory indulgence which went well with the soup.
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A very unflattering photo of some macarons.
I met a woman that went hard into macarons when covid started. She gave me and a few of her neighbors a little baking lesson. She is a great teacher and after the lesson, I feel confident that I could get good ones out of my kitchen after a little bit of trial and error with my oven & humidity. These are some that we made together.
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Lovely little lemon cakelets, this is a tender fine crumbed cake that bakes in about 10 minutes. These were made with lemon jam and brushed with lemon verbena syrup. I usually make a full recipe in a five cup Bundt but a half recipe makes 9 little cakelets. Inspired by Rachel Roddy’s Marmalade cake. This simple cake allows for a large variation of inclusions, from fruit to nuts.
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Hello friend it’s pleasure to be here and I wanted to know the the recipes of the apple desserts which are one of my favorite.
