I remember my mother making this cheesecake when I was a young child. My mother called this a New York-style cheesecake made with five packages of cream cheese and seven eggs, plus sour cream. So deliciously rich! It became a family tradition for my mother to make her cheesecake at Christmas. The recipe has become a staple in my cooking repertoire. And at Christmas, I make the basic cheesecake and change up the topping. If you flow my blog I’ve topped it with candied cranberries for a festive Christmas dessert.

This year I added a Heath Baking bits topping and drizzled it with white chocolate for a New Year’s Eve dessert. I’ll serve it with Champagne!

Crust:

2 1/4 cups (302g) graham cracker crumbs, Honey Made 

5 tbsp (65g) sugar, Domino’s Sugar

1/8 tsp salt

10 tbsp (140g) unsalted butter, melted, Cabot Creamery

Filling:

5 pkg.(8-oz) cream cheese softened, Philadelphia cream cheese

1 3/4 cups sugar, Domino’s Sugar

3 tablespoon flour, King Arthur flour

2 teaspoons grated lemon peel

1 1/2 grated orange peel

1/4 teaspoon vanilla, McCormack

5 eggs, plus 2 egg yolks

1/4 cup heavy cream

Topping

1/2 Heath Baking bits, Toffee bits

1/2 cup white chocolate, Ghiradelli chocolate

2 teaspoons shortening, Crisco

Preheat over to 325F. Grease the inside of the 9-inch springform pan(3 inches high). 

Make gram cracker crust: In a medium bowl, combine gram crackers, sugar, salt, and melted butter until blended—place in prepared springform pan. I like to use a measuring cup to press gram cracker crumbs on the bottom of the pan and two inches up the sides. Bake the crust for about 8-10 minutes, cool.

Preheat oven 450F.

Filling: In a large mixer bowl, blend cheese, sugar, flour, peels, and vanilla at high speed. Beat in eggs and yolks, one at a time: beat until smooth, occasionally scraping bowl with a spatula. Add cream and beat in until combined. Pour into pan. Bake 10 minutes. Lower oven to 250F. 

Remove cheesecake from the oven. Sprinkle Heath topping over cheesecake. 

Return to oven. Bake 1 hour longer or until the tester comes out clean. Remove pan to rack to cool, 2 hours.

Melt white chocolate according to package instructions. Stir in shortening—Drizzle over cheesecake. Chill until ready to serve. You can make this a day ahead and keep it in the refrigerator.

Enjoy!