My Baking & Cooking Passion

5th Daring Baker’s Challenge – Cheesecake Pops

Taking about Cheesecakes, I am no stranger to them… but I have never heard of Cheesecake Pops before… am I mountain tortoise or what??

Cheesecake Pops are cute little bites of cheesecake held on a stick and dipped in chocolate and also decorated with different toppings. These are fun and great for parties!

This month’s DB Challenge is hosted by Elle of Feeding My Enthusiasms and Deborah of Taste and Tell, and they have choosen Cheesecake Pops adopted from ‘Sticky, Chewy, Messy, Gooey’ by Jill O’Connor (looks like it’s going to be another recipe book on my wish list… hehehe). They have choosen this recipe as it allows us to put our creative juices and personal stamps on these cute little treats. This recipe also make use of the water bath method.

We are given the options to add flavors to the basic cheesecake recipe as long as they stay white in color, is about 2 ounce in size each and have it on a lollipop stick. But the shapes, dippings, toppings and decorations all completely up to us, which gives us alot of options to play with.

For me, I have added some golden rum to the basic cheesecake recipe, which gives them abit of liqour taste…

I have spent about 2 days making these wonderful treats…

1.   Day 1 to make the cheesecake, then put in the refrigerator to harder (I leave them in there for 2 days)
2.   On the 2 nite after I have put them into the fridge, I scoop them into balls of pops. Then put them into the freeze to froze (I leave overnite).
3.   Then Finally, on the next day morning, I did the finishing touch of dipping them into chocolate and added toppings/decorations to them.

The cheesecake melts quite fast… I have some problems working with them… I have to consistanly return them to the freezer to froze them so that they are easier to work with…

The ingredients used:

For dipping, toppings/decorations… I did not use all the variety thou I initially wanted =P

After the water bath and cooled, ready to go into the fridge…

Balls of cheesecakes… although not in perfect rounds…

Finally, the final product! Don’t them look like lollipops?!
 
 

They taste like ice-cream to me…hehehe

This is a great recipe to try especially for people who love cheesecakes… Never knew cheesecake can be eaten this way =). Thanks Elle & Deborah for choosing this wonderful recipe!!

Check out how the rest of the fellow DB did here. I am going to enjoy my Cheesecake Pops! Till next time!! hehe… =P
 

Ingredients:
Makes 30 – 40 Pops

5 packs of 8-oz. cream cheese, at room temperature
2 cups sugar
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
5 large eggs
2 egg yolks
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1/4 cup heavy cream
Boiling water as needed
30 – 40 lollipop sticks

For Dipping and Decorations:

1 pound chocolate (any kind), finely chopped
(Alternately, 1 pound of flavored coatings, also known as confectionary coating or wafer chocolate)
2 tablespoons vegetable shortening
Assorted decorations such as chopped nuts, colored jimmies, crushed peppermints, mini chocolate chips, sanding sugars (optional)

Method:

1.    Position oven rack in the middel of the oven and preheat to 325 degrees F. Set some water to boil.
2.    In a large bowl, beat together the cream cheese, sugar, flour, and salt until smooth. If using a mixer, mix on low speed. Add the whole eggs and the egg yolks, one at a time, beating well (but still at low speed) after each addition. Beat in the vanilla and cream.
3.    Grease a 10-inch cake pan (not a springform pan), and pour the batter into the cake pan. Place the pan in a larger roasting pan. Fill the roasting pan with boiling water until it reaches halfway up the sides of the cake pan. Bake until the cheesecake is firm and slightly golden on top, 35 to 45 minutes.
4.    Remove the cheesecake from the water bath and cool to room temperature. Cover the cheesecake with plastic wrap and refrigerate until very cold, at least 3 hours or up to overnight.
5.    When the cheesecake is cold and very firm, scoop the cheesecake into 2-ounce balls and place on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Carefully insert a lollipop stick into each cheesecake ball. Freeze the cheesecake pops, uncovered, until very hard, at least 1 – 2 hours.
6.    When the cheesecake pops are frozen and ready for dipping, prepare the chocolate. In the top of a double boiler, set over simmering water, or in a heatproof bowl set over a pot of simmering water, heat half the chocolate and half the shortening, stirring often, until chocolate is melted and chocolate and shortening are combined. Stir until completely smooth. Do not heat the chocolate too much or your chocolate will lose it’s shine after it hasdried. Save the rest of the chocolate and shortening for later dipping, or use another type of chocolate for variety. Alternately, you can microwave the same amount of chocolate coating pieces on high at 30 second intervals, stirring until smooth.
7.    Quickly dip a frozen cheesecake pop in the melted chocolate, swirling quickly to coat it completely. Shake off any excess into the melted chocolate. If you like, you can now roll the pops quickly in optional decorations. You can also drizzle them with a contrasting color of melted chocolate (dark chocolate dizzled over milk chocolate or white chocolate over dark chocolate, etc.). Place the pop on a clean parchment paper-lined baking sheet to set. Repeat with remaining pops, melting more chocolate and shortening (or confectionary chocolate pieces) as needed.
8.    Regrigerate the pops for up to 24 hours, until ready to serve.