Junior’s Famous New York Cheesecake

Oh. My. Gosh. ... you guys! Ok, if you even remotely think that you like cheesecake, you HAVE to find time in your life for this one! Now, keep in mind, you're focusing on the cheesecake part - you can top it with anything your little heart desires, or top it with nothing and it would still be amaze-balls!!!

(You have to make it the night before, so patience is key on this one... you must anticipate your craving! lol)

LOOK AT HOW FLUFFY IT IS!!!!!!

Have I said this yet - I think I'm having a piece for breakfast this morning, I swear! It's waaaay to damn good not to eat the whole thing.

Seriously though - my husband, who is not a cheesecake guy - complimented it more than once last night. You can't go wrong with that!

This is a recipe that you bake the night before and then eat the next day. The recipe came from www.villagevoice.com with a neat write up on the creator of this piece, and after making it, it TOTALLY lives up to the hype - no joke!

Ok - on with it (now that you know how much I love it haha!).

Prepare a 8.5-9" spring pan by greasing it well, and then line the bottom of it with foil. Set it into a deep cookie dish (this will be for the water bath later).

In a bowl, add your graham crackers, sugar and melted butter. Mush them all together and press them gently into the bottom of the pan.

In your stand mixer, blend one block of cream cheese, cornstarch and 1/3 cp sugar for about 3 minutes to ensure it's good and blended together. Then add in one pack of cream cheese at a time until fully blended. Add in the sugar and vanilla and blend. Next, add one egg at a time, mixing thoroughly, and finally the cream.

[gard align='center']

Pour it all into your pan and set it in the oven. Once it is in the oven, you will want to add hot water to the cookie sheet about 1/2 way full - be careful not to allow any water to go over the sides of the foil wrapped base.

Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes... You'll see the top rise...

And then settle....

You'll know it's done when the sides have pulled away and the top is a nice even golden brown.

Turn off the oven, crack the door open and let the cake sit in the over for 2 hours. Yes - 2! Be patient! Then it will need to sit on the counter for several hours more while it completely cools. You'll put it in the fridge overnight, but it you put it in too soon, it will sweat. Not a really big deal, but you don't want it too moist.

The next day, take it out of the fridge and gently remove the spring portion of your pan, revealing this GEM!

You can leave it on the base of the pan as you see above... just put that on your fanciest dish 'cause this one deserves it!

You can then top with whatever you like. Some ideas might be strawberries (see below!!), oreo cookies crunched up - whatever you like. But since I was going to turtle...

I used Smucker's brand caramel and hot fudge to drizzle over the top, and then added some chopped pecans. To. Die. For.

It looked sooooo pretty - almost (but not quite) too pretty to cut.

But I did - and it was fluffy, and yet firm, and rich and perfect!

Strawberry Dark Chocolate variation

Ok, I finally strayed from the turtle... like over 2 years later! lol.

Try this - Put 2cp finely chopped strawberries, 3 tbs organic sugar, 3 tbs orange juice in a bowl and let it sit for a couple of hours (brings the juice out of the strawberries). Drain them well and top your cheesecake. Garnish with melted dark chocolate drizzle and fresh strawberries! SOOOOOO good! If you have fresh whipped topping on hand, throw a little of that in the mix too. You can't go wrong!

OMG, right?! When you make your own, don't forget to take a photo and share it online at Facebook, Twitter or Instagram with the hashtag #recipesbyjenn and by tagging @recipesbyjenn. That way, I can see your photos and share them with all my friends! Plus, I get to feature them on this site along with all my other photos!