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The Crisper Whisperer: Zucchini and Corn Fritters Rule the World. For Reals
This look delicious and I LOVE the column. I adore zucchini and am, I think, the only one enjoying the surplus of it in my basket. Baked Zucchini & tomatoes anyone? Or, even better, Chocolate-Zucchini bundt cake!
Weekend Cook and Tell Round Up: Tomatoes
Here you go, my Baked Zucchini & Tomatoes: http://www.thenaptimechef.com/2009/07/napping-with-edible-vineyard-sunday.html
And my slow-roasted tomatoes, delicious!: http://www.thenaptimechef.com/2009/07/napping-with-vegetable-roasting-rules.html
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Eggnog Cheesecake with Gingersnap Crust & Pomegranate Glaze
Posted by TheNaptimeChef, November 21, 2009 at 8:55 AM
Corn Pudding with Parmesan Crust
Posted by TheNaptimeChef, November 20, 2009 at 8:55 AM
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Recent Comments | Response to Comments
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
Great choice and great job with the execution. I like Little Red Hens for all of their baked goods and all-around great shop. If you ever need recipes let me know, I have a cheesecake recipe that won the Abraham & Strauss Cheesecake contest in 1968 - it is SOO good.
The Crisper Whisperer: Zucchini and Corn Fritters Rule the World. For Reals
This look delicious and I LOVE the column. I adore zucchini and am, I think, the only one enjoying the surplus of it in my basket. Baked Zucchini & tomatoes anyone? Or, even better, Chocolate-Zucchini bundt cake!
Weekend Cook and Tell Round Up: Tomatoes
Here you go, my Baked Zucchini & Tomatoes: http://www.thenaptimechef.com/2009/07/napping-with-edible-vineyard-sunday.html
And my slow-roasted tomatoes, delicious!: http://www.thenaptimechef.com/2009/07/napping-with-vegetable-roasting-rules.html
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
I know you were looking for the best cheesecake in NY, but to find the best cheesecake in the world take the GW across to Clifton, NJ for Marc's Cheesecake! It is much more than worth the trip!
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
I'd love to see a set of Ricotta cheesecakes done - they are very hard to find compared to NY Style, but I grew up with my dad (Cuban) making a bunch of these as Christmas gifts for friends from a recipe a very generous Italian neighbor gave him.
The friends always raved, and when I made one myself about a year ago for a family gathering of my wife's relatives, by the time I got around to trying a slice... I actually never got a slice - it was all gone! :)
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
I don't think we're arguing what cheesecake is the most authentic. The people who claim that the only authentic cheesecakes are made from cream cheese are sorely mistaken. There are several traditional recipes: New York/Jewish (Cream Cheese), Italian (Ricotta), and some cheesecakes use a mixture of cheeses, such as mascarpone and chevre. These cheeses are very popular in French cuisine. The best cheesecake I've ever tasted was made in France. It was actually a chevre and cream cheese combination with a walnut crust; a wonderful cheesecake that I make to this day. Plain cream cheese and graham cracker crust is just too boring for me and most people who like to have their taste buds excited. It's like traditional apple pie...very boring. If you're palate is satisfied with plain jane cheesecake then opt for New York style.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
The French have a dish hey call cassoulet. Every time I'm in the region, I see places that swear they have le vrai - the true cassoulet, . As I learned, there is no such thing as the real cassoulet, or the real cheesecake. The roots go way back into history, and depend on who's doing the cooking.
Do we really need this bickering?
If you love whatever you have on your fork, then that's the one.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
There's nothing wrong with sour cream in a cheesecake. At my restaurant we used some butter milk in the mix, to lend a mildly tart taste. It worked perfectly. A bit of grated lemon rind supported the richness. We never used a graham cracker crust.. Our pastry guy James Shupe got raves for his work, people asked for seconds. Of course we used the best cream cheese -- Philly.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
My cheesecake is authentic NY Cheesecake. I use a graham cracker crust. I also use other ground cookies depending on the flavor of cake I'm making. i.e. Crushed Chocolate Grahams for chocolate cheesecake and crushed animal crackers for Key Lime cheesecake.
I do agree on the "no sour cream" etc. I have used other brands of cream cheese - high quality, sold in bulk to restaurants - and had fabulous results. A "blanket slur" cannot be launched against any other brand except Philadelphia. Restaurant suppliers carry many extremely good brands of cream cheese .
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
@polly302 - Carnegie Deli has the best cheesecake I have eaten also. I have no idea where they get the cheesecake from, but it is tops in my book. I have eaten Eileens and Juniors but CD is my favorite.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
What no Veniero's? http://www.venierospastry.com/
It's a mystery to me how a bakery where everything else is borderline inedible makes such a great NY cheesecake.
I do not claim that this is "the best", just that you cannot award the title without having tried this one.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
There are many "secrets" to cheesecake, depending on what
you're used to. If you're used to the original Lindy's (not the modern
restaurant of the same name) or Turf cheesecake in NY, the
"secrets" are:
1. Never use any cheese but Philadelphia Brand Cream Cheese.
That's ANY cheese. No cheeses other than cream cheese. No
cream cheese other than Philly. Especially, no "baker's
cheese"--an abomination for this recipe. The NY Times Cook
book used to have the "right" recipe. But the latest
edition adds extra ingredients. The latest edition of the
NY Times International Cookbook has the right recipe, except
they use a graham cracker crust, which isn't quite authentic.
2. No sour cream. None. Zero.
3. Cake crust, not a graham cracker crust.
Molly Lukens' "New York Cookbook" has two recipes that are almost
right--the Lindy's and the Junior's. What I would do for the
absolute, true taam is make the crust from the Lindy's recipe
in Lukens' book, and the filling from the NY Times International
Cookbook.
Note that I'm of a certain age such that I've eaten both originals,
at Lindy's and Turf's--both long gone.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
I once held at party at which I served nothing but 5 different cheesecakes I had baked myself (mostly out of "The Joy of Cheesecake").
My favorite, though, is the dark incredibly rich chocolate cheesecake from "Maida Heatter's Book of Great Chocolate Desserts." Yummmmm.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
Cheesecake has been my specialty since I was a teenager. Real, NY style cheesecake is not made with anything but cream cheese (as the "cheese"). No sour cream, no mascarpone, no chevre and no ricotta.
I love to sample all kinds of cheesecakes - whether they're NY style, Italian, or any other variety. There is, however, only one NY style cheesecake - it's dense and rich and smooth and made with very few ingredients.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
As a chef, the best tasting cheesecake that keeps people coming back for more is made with a blend of Chevre (goat cheese) and Cream Cheeses. Add a walnut crust and some garnishes and it's the best slice of heaven you'll ever taste. The creamy texture and sweet-sour flavor of this cheesecake is unparalled greatness.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
@Semarr - I'm really surprised the people on line didn't applaud! NYers love that kind of declaration. If I were in line, I would have applauded.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
mmm. I love the Zabar's cheesecake.
One time, years ago, I was standing on line at the cake counter at Zabar's, and I was quietly on the phone with a friend who was also living in the city, up near Columbia, at the time. She asked me what I was doing, and I said I was buying a cheesecake. Then she asked what the occasion was, if I had people coming over. I said there was none, and she chastised me for my frivolity. Then, intoxicated by the freedom of Living Alone In New York City With A Job I Got All By Myself, I shouted into the phone, "I'M 26 YEARS OLD. I CAN BUY A GODDAMN CHEESECAKE JUST FOR MYSELF IF I WANT TO."
Everyone on the dairy side of Zabar's stared at me.
I blushed, thoroughly embarrassed, but I held fast in that line, and I got my cheesecake. And it was delicious for the two days that it lasted.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
The Cheesecake Factory's food is much better than their cheesecake.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
Cheesecake Factory? It is waxy and frozen and gummy. It has a beautiful look to it because its full of enough preservatives no one can spell. It is not a cheesecake it is a dessert with some cheese like products in it.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
@lemonfair - I like certain desserts that are fluffy, like chocolate mousse. I'm sure other SEers like fluffy desserts. They might even enjoy a fluffy cheesecake every now and then. But those fluffy cheesecakes are not NY Cheesecakes. A NY Cheesecake, by definition, is "deliciously dense" as you put it. What SEers who are enjoying fluffy cakes are actually eating is west coast style cheesecake.
I could eat a turkey and call it a pig - it doesn't change the fact that I'm eating turkey.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
I'm astonished there are New York tasters who like light and fluffy. In my search for the perfect recipe I can usually rely on New York Style being deliciously dense.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
These SE taste tests are too subjective to judge what is "the best". I just bought a 6" raspberry swirl cheesecake from Junior's Times Square, and, although it may not be "the best", it was certainly not too dense or heavy.
If anyone reading this is in the neighborhood of Scotch Plains, NJ, the homemade cheesecake at Swiss Pastry Shoppe on E. 2nd St. makes the best around here. A 7" cheesecake costs $12, and is made personally by the owner, who used to be the head pastry chef at Sardi's.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
Looks great. I think the best restaurant cheesecake I have ever had was at the Tasting Room about 9 years ago. I still remember it. omg so good.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
Oh no! You guys missed the best...pls make sure to try Monteleone + Cammareri on Court St in Cobble Hill when you get a chance. Their American cheesecake is the best I've ever had and the Italian one isn't bad either. Plus they have pumpkin cheesecake this time of year, too!
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
@peekpoke et al: Guys, "fluffy" was used as a comparative term here. Compared to Junior's, a flourless chocolate cake is "fluffy." Eileen's cheesecakes aren't cheese pies, or ricotta cakes, but proper cheesecakes, simply less obscenely dense than some of the others.
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
@shortstop thats weird i even checked on Yelp and someone commented about it on 7/2009. but thats sad! boo
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
Fluffy and light is CHEESE PIE, not cheesecake. A sometimes nobake confection.
If you don't like cheesecake, fine. But don't eat fluffy creamy cheese pie, and say it's great cheesecake.
Reminds of Jeffrey Steingarten talking about having a pastrami tasting when some of the judges clearly didn't like pastrami and kept rating up lean spiced roast beef things!
Serious Eats Finds New York's Best Cheesecake
@chiff, that is so perfect.
I'm sad that I wasn't invited. I wish I would've majored in taste-testing in college.
Recent Posts
Eggnog Cheesecake with Gingersnap Crust & Pomegranate Glaze
Posted by TheNaptimeChef, November 21, 2009 at 8:55 AM
Corn Pudding with Parmesan Crust
Posted by TheNaptimeChef, November 20, 2009 at 8:55 AM
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread
Posted by TheNaptimeChef, November 15, 2009 at 1:55 PM
Cinnamon-Sugar Caramel Muffins
Posted by TheNaptimeChef, November 1, 2009 at 2:55 PM
Paprika Pork Stew with Sour Cream
Posted by TheNaptimeChef, October 21, 2009 at 4:55 PM
Sticky Buns with Pecans and Craisin
Posted by TheNaptimeChef, October 17, 2009 at 6:55 PM
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About TheNaptimeChef
Website: http://www.thenaptimechef.com
Location: New York, NY
About: I am a mother who believes that parents don't have to give up good food just because they have children. I live in NYC with my husband and daughter, and enjoy cooking and baking while my daughter takes her afternoon nap.
Favorite foods: Roasted Vegetables, Cheese, Pasta, Anything Chocolate
Last bite on earth: A perfect profiterole - buttery pastry, vanilla ice-cream, drizzled with dark chocolate.
Great choice and great job with the execution. I like Little Red Hens for all of their baked goods and all-around great shop. If you ever need recipes let me know, I have a cheesecake recipe that won the Abraham & Strauss Cheesecake contest in 1968 - it is SOO good.