Top Secret family recipe no bake cheesecake

I have been eating this cheesecake since I was a tiny tot when my grandma and mom used to make it for me as a kid. I love it because it is super easy to make with few ingredients and minimal mess. It also tastes better than a tradition baked cheesecake in my opinion.


INGREDIENTS

1 package Original Philadelphia cream cheese
1 package Original Cool Whip
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup powdered sugar
1 premade graham cracker crust


Cream the cream cheese with a whisk or kitchenaide with the paddle blade to make it nice and smooth. If you don't cream it, you'll get lumps of cream cheese in the cake.


Juice your lemon and add lemon juice and vanilla to the bowl and mix until incorporated. Add powdered sugar and mix until combined. Add Cool Whip and combine until smooth and creamy.



Use a spatula to scrape the filling into the premade graham cracker crust and smooth out.



I used little individual graham cracker crusts for Christmas.



If you'd like to make a strawberry topping you will need a half cup of strawberries, fresh or frozen and diced into small pieces. Add one teaspoon of granulated sugar to the strawberries, mix and left sit in the refrigerator for one hour until the juices have started to make a syrup. Serve on top of the cake.

Nicholas' birthday cakes

So I'm late with this (sorry Coz!), but here are the two cakes I made for Nicholas' birthday earlier this month. I made one for us to have on his birthday at our house and one for his party at Chuck E. Cheese's. (Click the pictures to see them fully)


This is the cake we had at home. I made a white cake and used a basic white icing that I dyed with Wilton icing colors. The black color tasted a bit bitter. Next time I think I should add in some cocoa to get better flavor and help make it darker without so much icing dye. I used a Wilton medium star tip and traced the Mickey design into the crumb coat with a knife before piping the design.


The big party cake. It was originally going to be a two tier cake, but lack of attendance at the party reduced it to one tier. I believe I made this a white cake as well with sprinkles added for color. I crumb coated it with basic white frosting and used the same frosting dyed blue for the top. I used the small line tip and purple dyed frosting to freehand the flower designs on the cake and made my first ever border around the bottom of the cake with the flower tip and green dyed frosting. The characters were bought on eBay. The pineapple house was made by molding rice crispy treats and covering with a thin layer of frosting and then covered with pre-colored Wilton fondant.

Brandon's birthday cake

This was a devil's food cake with homemade raspberry filling and a fluffy white frosting. The three red birds are made from pre-colored fondant.

Apple Pie

Crust
2 1/2 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
10 Tbsp unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1/2 cups solid vegetable shortening, chilled, cut into pieces
4 Tbsp ice water

Filling
3 1/2 lbs apples, peeling, cored, and thinly sliced
3/4 cups plus 1 Tbsp suger
1 tsp fresh lemon juice
1/2 tsp plus large pinch ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 Tbsp flour
3 Tbsp unsalted butter, diced
1 Tbsp whole milk

This was my first time making a pie, and writing out those ingredients I realize that I missed a couple things! It came out pretty yummy, although the end product could have looked prettier if I could get the crust to cooperate.

Whisk dry ingredients for the crust. Add butter and shortening and combine until the fats form pea sized grains in the dry ingredients. Sprinkle with the ice water and blend until a ball forms. Divide in half and form each half into a disc. Wrap in plastic and refridgerate for at least an hour.





Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Prepare the filling by combining the apples, sugar, lemon juice, cinnamon, and vanilla in a bowl. Add the flour right before adding the filling to the crust.

Roll out the bottom crust and drape it into the pie pan (or if you're like me and can't get the dough to cooperate, just smoosh the pie dough onto the bottom of the pan!). Add the filling and dot it with the butter. Roll out the top crust (if you can!) and drape it over the filling. Crimp the top and bottom crusts together and cut vent holes in the top. If your pie crust is like mine, it will conveniently already have lots of vent holes in it when you get it on top of the filling! Brush the top crust with milk. Combine a bit of sugar and cinnamon and sprinkle generously over the top.

Pop the pie in the oven and immediatly reduce the heat to 375. Bake for about 2 hours, or until the top is brown and filling is bubbly.

Stromboli

Ingredients

1 1/2 packages dry yeast
1 tablespoon sugar
2 cups water, warm (110~)
1 tablespoon salt
5-6 cups flour
1 egg white
1 tablespoon water, cold
2 cups mozzerella cheese
1 package of pepperoni, or other toppings


Dissolve the yeast in the warm water and let it sit until it starts to foam. Add sugar, salt, and 5 cups of the flour. It the dough is still sticky, add more flour. Knead until it forms a smooth ball.

Let the dough rise in a covered greased bowl for about an hour. I like to turn my oven on to the lowest temperature for a couple minutes, turn the oven off and put my bowl in the warm oven to rise.

Punch down the dough and divide into 8-10 even balls. Roll them out into circles and fill with the mozzerella and other toppings. Fold over the dough and pinch to seal on all sides. They should be rectangular. Pleace on a greased baking sheet and cut slits in the top of the dough so that the steam can be released. Beat egg whites with the cold water and brush the tops and sides of the dough.

Bake at 400 degrees for 20-30 minutes. Be careful, these are hot!

Potato Bacon Soup

4-6 slices bacon, chopped
1/2 yellow onion, chopped finely
2 large carrots, diced finely
4 stalks celery, diced finely
3-4 cloves garlic, diced very finely
2 T flour
4 Cups chicken broth (low sodium)
2 Lbs russet potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 bay leaf
Black pepper and salt to taste
Shredded sharp cheddar cheese
1/2 Pint half-and-half


Cook chopped bacon in a large pot until crispy and the fat has rendered out of it. Scoop out bacon and drain while leaving the bacon fat in the pot.

Toss in onion, celery, carrots, and garlic on medium heat and sweat for a few minutes until aromatic and onoins start to look translucent. Add enough flour to soak up the remaining bacon fat and cook, stiring constantly for about a minute.

Add chicken broth, potato cubes, bay leaf, and some black pepper. Simmer on medium-low until the potatoes are tender, about 20 minutes.



Scoop out half of the soup and blend until smooth. Add blended soup back into the pot with unblended soup. Add half-and-half and stir to mix. Lattle into cups and top with sharp cheddar cheese and bacon crumbles.

Bagels

4 cups bread flour
1 T sugar
1-1/2 t salt
1 T vegetable oil
2 t instant yeast
1-1/4 to 1-1/2 cups of warm water

Mix everything. The dough should be pretty still. Add more water if you're having trouble getting all of the flour incorporated. Kneed until the dough is smooth, about 10 minutes.

Cut the dough into 8 pieces and roll em up into balls and let them rest for 10-20 minutes. Preheat the oven to 425.



The recipe says to roll the dough into little snakes and connect the ends. I like to use my thumbs to make a whole in the middle of the ball and stretch them out a little so they don't have a seam.



Let them rest for 20 minutes while you boil a big pot of water and grease a baking sheet with vegetable oil or cooking spray.

Drop the bagels in the water. Make sure not to crowd them. Let them boil for a minute on each side, drain the water, and plop them on the baking sheet. You can also shake the moist bagels in some sesame seeds before putting them on the baking sheet to give them a toasty crust.

Bake for 10 minutes, flip em, and bake them for another 10 minutes.

Let em cool and they're ready!