My favorite cheesecake recipe! Sephora sale tips! And books books books!
Bay Area friends! Tomorrow, April 27th, I'll be a guest bookseller at East Bay Booksellers in Oakland from 11-1 for Independent Bookstore Day! Come say hi and buy some books, and a few lucky people will get galleys of The Wedding Party! A few hours later I'll jump on a plane to London to do a few days of research for Royal Holiday, so please forgive me if I look like I've stayed up all night packing (hopefully that won't be the case, but you never know!).
These next few weeks are some of the most wonderful times of the year, friends. That's right, Sephora sale season is upon us (the timing and the level of discount depends on your Beauty Insider status; you have to be a Beauty Insider to get the sale, which is basically just signing up with your email address and your birthday). I tend to use Sephora sale time to stock up on stuff I use all the time (I'm going to get a big vat of my new favorite conditioner), splurge on a few things (I loved the travel size of this Nest candle and I think I'm going to get a bigger one; I also love their lavender one), and get a bundle of my favorite sheet masks for cheaper (these Dr. Jart Vital Hydra Solution ones, I have dry-ish skin so your mileage may vary). I'm not letting myself get any lipsticks this time (I know, right? But I have so many, you guys), but if you are and want a splurge, my favorite higher end lipstick brands are YSL and Pat McGrath -- I've tried many from both brands and have been really happy with them all. Good luck shopping, please tell me your faves!
May is going to be SUCH a good book month, you guys! There are four books that I'm super excited about that come out in May, and I'll tell you about two of them this week. First, The Bride Test, by Helen Hoang! I know many of you loved The Kiss Quotient, her first book, and you're all going to want to preorder this one before you even finish this newsletter. There are so many great things about this book, but I loved both main characters' relationships with their families, and all of the ways their emotions around family played a role in their love story. And you can get signed copies of The Bride Test from The Ripped Bodice if you order before May 5, and Helen's handwriting is SO BEAUTIFUL that I know you're going to want to do that! Second, I loved loved loved Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors, by Sonali Dev -- I read this almost 500 page book in one day (I was on vacation, but still). This is a gender flipped version of Pride and Prejudice and I loved that part of it, but the story is so much more than a P&P rehash -- it has complicated family relationships with deep love and hurt feelings on all sides, ambition, and some of the best sounding food I've ever encountered in literature. Both of these books come out May 7th, take the 7th and the 8th off and read them both!
It feels wild that I haven't given you one of my favorite recipes yet, but I don't think I have! I make this White Chocolate Cheesecake with Strawberries every Easter, and it's one of my favorite things I make all year. Here it is from this Easter. Here's the recipe online, but it skips a key step (I started making this when it was in Bon Appetit years ago, so I'm glad I had the original recipe the first few times I made it). Also, it calls for a 10 inch springform pan, but this year we had a smaller group for Easter, so I experimented and used 3/4 of the recipe (everything divides easily except for the whipping cream, so I just guestimated there) and put it in an 8 inch springform pan and it was perfect.
White Chocolate and Strawberry Cheesecake
Ingredients
Crust
1 9 ounce package chocolate wafer cookies*
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
Filling
1 pound good quality white chocolate, finely chopped
4 8 ounce packages cream cheese, room temperature
1 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
4 large eggs
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup whipping cream
2 tablespoons vanilla extract
3 1 pint baskets strawberries, hulled and halved (I usually don't need all of the strawberries)
1/2 cup apricot preserves
2 tablespoons brandy
*These are a pain to find; Nabisco chocolate wafer cookies are the major brand, and I often have to go to a few grocery stores for them. They're worth it, but in a pinch, you can use Oreos instead.
Preparation
Crust:
Position rack in the center of the oven, and preheat to 325 F. Butter a 10 inch springform pan and wrap the outside of the pan tightly with a few layers of aluminum foil. Finely grind the cookies in a food processor, then add melted butter and process again for just a few seconds. Press the crumbs into the bottom and 2 inches up the sides of the pan, and bake until the crust is set, about 15 minutes. Cool the crust on a rack, and maintain the oven temperature.
Filling:
Stir the white chocolate in the top of a double boiler set over barely simmering water until it's melted and smooth. You can also do this in a microwave, but do it on low power for only 30 seconds at a time and stir in between each blast. Cool the white chocolate to lukewarm.
In a stand mixer or electric mixer, beat the cream cheese until fluffy, about two to three minutes. Gradually add the sugar and salt, and beat until smooth. Add the eggs one at a time, and beat well after each addition. Then add the sour cream, whipping cream, and vanilla and beat until blended.
Fold in the white chocolate and stir until the mixture is blended. Pour carefully into the prepared pan (it usually makes a little too much for the pan, I'd take about a 1/4 cup of the filling out first, and don't fill the pan up all the way). Now it's time for the water bath! Baking a cheesecake in a water bath makes it cook more evenly and makes the top less likely to crack (and it's why you put the many layers of foil outside the springform pan). It's a little fiddly and you don't have to do this part, but I always regret it when I don't (I didn't this Easter because I forgot, and it was totally okay, but I wished I had). Here's how you do it: get a heavy roasting pan big enough so your springform pan fits inside easily. Set your pan, filled with the unbaked cheesecake, inside the roasting pan. Pour hot water into the sides of the roasting pan VERY CAREFULLY (you don't want to get water in your cheesecake!) so that you have about two inches of water along the sides of the springform pan. Put the whole roasting pan inside the oven (again, very carefully).
Bake the cake until the top begins to brown, but the center is still slightly jiggly when you shake the pan, about an hour and 20 minutes. (When I made this in an 8 inch pan with 3/4 of the filling, it still needed the same cooking time). Open the oven door a few inches and turn off the oven but leave the cheesecake in the oven for 30 minutes (if your oven doesn't stay open on its own, stick the handle of a wooden spoon in there to keep it propped open). Remove the cheesecake from the water bath, and set it, uncovered, in the fridge. Chill the cake in the fridge uncovered overnight, or for at least 8 hours.
When you're about ready to serve (or up to a few hours in advance), run a knife between the pan sides and cake and release the pan sides. Starting at the outside of the cake, arrange the strawberry halves in overlapping circles, eventually covering the top of the cake completely. Stir the preserves and brandy together in a saucepan until it boils; brush or drizzle the glaze over the strawberries. Keep chilled until right before you serve.
Have a great weekend!
Jasmine
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Buy The Wedding Date and The Proposal, and preorder The Wedding Party and Royal Holiday!