Happy Birthday Nancey!!!!

A friend of mine has a birthday

Tuesday, January 13. She doesn't know it, but I'm making a special cake just for her. It's a CHEESECAKE!

Here are the ingredients for the crust: 1 package graham crackers 1/4 cup brown sugar 1/2 stick unsalted butter

I melted the butter, combined it with the crushed graham crackers and sugar, and pressed into a 7-inch spring form pan, bottom and sides. I popped this into the freezer while I made the filling. I originally developed this recipe for a 9-inch pan, but I'm using the smaller pan for my friend so I'll have some cheesecake leftover since Mr. Hawthorne gets pissy, pitiful, and pouty if he doesn't get some of whatever I've made for someone else.

Here are my ingredients: 2 8-ounce packages cream cheese 1 cup sugar 3 eggs 3 TB corn starch Juice of one lemon Grated zest of 1/2 lemon 4 TB (1/2 stick) melted butter 1/2 cup sour cream vanilla

I let my cream cheese soften, then I beat it and added the cup of sugar.

Next, the eggs went in, one at a time.

The cornstarch went in.

And the juice of one lemon, without that little seed, which stayed in the cup, thankfully.

Melted butter went in.

As always, vanilla goes into the mix.

Now, I had no sour cream. Imagine that. But, I did have creme fraiche. Imagine that! So I added 1/2 cup creme fraiche to the mix. Now, for those of you who don't know how to make your own creme fraiche, it's quite simple and so much better than store-bought sour cream. My ingredients for creme fraiche: heavy cream buttermilk lemon juice And yes, my buttermilk is over 3 months old. But it's still fine.

One cup of heavy cream. Add in 1 tablespoon of buttermilk.

And add in 1 tablespoon of lemon juice.

Cover and set at room temperature for about 10 hours.

And here's the final product. It gets nice and clotty. I just stir it to smooth it out. And it will thicken up like sour cream. Now, back to your regularly scheduled cheesecake.

I mixed everything very well, then poured it into the prepared pan.

And sprinkled lemon zest over top.

I had enough for the springform pan and 2 ramekins. God forbid Mr. Hawthorne doesn't get his sample. The cheesecakes went into a preheated 400 degree oven for 15 minutes. Then I cut the temperature down to 350 and cooked for 30 minutes more. I cut the oven off and let the cheesecakes sit in there with the door ajar until the oven was cool.

While the cheesecakes were cooking, I picked a bunch of bay leaves. (You could use holly.) You need a shiny, stiff leaf. I melted some Nestle's Semi Sweet Chocolate Chips with a bit of vegetable oil.

I painted the underside of the leaves with the chocolate, and placed the pan of leaves in the fridge.

After 45 minutes, here are my cheesecakes. Now, fast forward to Tuesday morning.

I got out the cheesecake and leaves.

And carefully pulled the chocolate away from the leaf. Halfway through this procedure, I returned the leaves back to the fridge to chill. You can't work with room temperature chocolate.

I melted the rest of the leftover Nestle's Semi-Sweet chips and drizzled the chocolate down the side. Next, I prepared the caramel for the spun sugar.

Blend one cup sugar and 1/3 cup water in a saucepan. Bring to a simmer, remove from heat, and swirl the pan to be sure the sugar has dissolved completely and the liquid is perfectly clear. Return the pan to the heat and cover, checking every minute or so, swirling ...

... until you have this nice amber color. Remove from heat and cool for a bit before you start spinning the sugar.

I decorated the bottom of the cake with the chocolate leaves.

Then I put some leaves on top and in the middle. I dipped my fork into the caramel and drizzled over top the cake.

Keep on drizzling.

And drizzling.

And drizzling.

Ta daaaa!!!! Then I drove up to Nancey's office to surprise her.

I think Nancey was surprised. Here's Nancey ogling her cheesecake and uber-office manager, Liz, who was shooting pictures.

Oooooh ......

Mmmmmmmm...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, NANCEY!!!

In case you want to see the caramel being drizzled, here it is. I know. I know. Drizzling caramel. Melting butter in a pan. Watching paint dry. Cutting edge videography, I tell you. Keeps 'em beggin' for more.