29 recipes. Page 1 of 2
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No crust goes into the pan, only a tall collar of parchment, and the batter bakes at 230°C until the top turns deep brown with a bitter caramel smell. After four hours or more in the fridge the cake is firm, and a while at room temperature before serving brings the center back to soft and creamy.
All the tang and heat of Buffalo wings, minus the bones: shredded cooked chicken baked with cream cheese, cayenne hot sauce, ranch and blue cheese until hot through. With the chicken already cooked, the oven only has to bring the center to 74°C, and raw chicken does not belong in this timing.
A skewered sausage gets a log of chilled cream cheese pressed alongside, then batter and breadcrumbs before frying. The batter has to cover the cheese right to the ends, and frozen cream cheese runs even less. Under the crumb shell, the cheese melts and comes through with the sausage in each bite.
Dried persimmons are split along one side, opened flat, and rolled around cream cheese mixed with honey and lemon juice, plus coarsely chopped walnuts. After 20 minutes wrapped in the fridge, each slice shows a round of white cream and walnut inside the chewy fruit. If the persimmons have dried hard, five minutes in a damp paper towel keeps them from tearing as they are opened.
Part of the white beans is mashed with a fork and stirred back in, thickening the broth without flour, while the rest stay whole. The chicken is already cooked and simply shredded, and the heat level is built around mild canned green chiles.
Simmered with the skins on, the figs turn into a jam full of seeds and soft bits of fruit that sits in a layer over cream cheese on warm baguette. Because those skins give the jam its color and texture, the figs get a quick rinse and an immediate pat dry rather than a scrub. Low heat keeps the red color and fruity smell that a hard boil would dull. The jam firms up as it cools and should leave the stove while still loose rather than set in the pot. Warming the baguette whole before slicing keeps the crumb soft while the crust crisps. Served with hot drip coffee, it makes a quick breakfast, and leftover jam keeps in the fridge for 5 days.
Sifted black rice flour turns the cream cheese filling pale lilac and leaves a toasty grain flavor behind the tang of the cheese. Chilled and sliced, the lilac filling sits in a clean line against the shell.
A warm side to spoon next to a steak: chopped spinach bound in a thick sauce of cream cheese and cream. Once wilted, the spinach is pressed hard in a sieve before it meets the sauce.
Cream cheese and sour cream form the base of this warm dip, with spinach, artichoke, Parmesan, and mozzarella folded in before it bakes until bubbling. Each cheese has a role: cream cheese for body, sour cream for a light tang, Parmesan for salt, mozzarella for stretch. One dish in the middle of the table feeds a group, scooped up with baguette slices or tortilla chips while it is still hot.
Brown sugar and cinnamon are scattered over buttered dough before it is rolled, and in the oven the sugar melts with the butter into a dark, sticky layer along every turn. The top gets softened cream cheese instead of a sugar glaze, spread after the rolls have cooled for about five minutes so it softens and spreads easily over the warm surface.
One chip dragged to the bottom of the dish should pick up refried beans, cream cheese, guacamole, salsa, cheddar, olives and scallions at once. Draining the salsa for 10 minutes keeps its juice from bleeding into the layers, and spreading each layer in small dollops avoids dragging up the one underneath.
The mushroom stems are not thrown away: they are chopped, cooked with garlic and mixed into a filling of cream cheese, Parmesan and breadcrumbs that goes back into the caps. In the oven the top of the filling turns golden and the melted cream cheese mingles with the mushroom juices.
Made with vegetable oil rather than butter, this cake stays soft even straight out of the fridge. Finely grated carrot gives off moisture as it bakes and keeps the crumb moist, alongside cinnamon, nutmeg and coarsely chopped walnuts. A tangy cream cheese frosting goes on top.
Swedish kanelbulle go lighter on sugar and add cardamom; American rolls are coiled thicker and covered in glaze. This one sits on the American side, with a cream cheese glaze spread on while the rolls are still warm. In the oven the sugar melts between the coils and turns sticky, and the soft bread unwinds by hand along the spiral.
Strips of puff pastry wound around a cone mold bake into a hollow spiral horn, which is then piped full of whipped cream folded into cream cheese. The thawed pastry stays cold and is cut into strips without rolling or stretching it, which protects the flaky layers. Sugar pressed onto the surface bakes into a crisp coating, and each bite brings the open layers and the cold cream together.
Two Earl Grey tea bags steep in warm cream that then goes into the cream cheese filling, so the cheesecake tastes like milk tea under the richness of the cheese. The cream is only warmed at the edges, never boiled, and the bags come out without squeezing. Baked in a water bath over a pressed digestive-biscuit base, the filling sets smooth and even.
Hallabong, a Jeju citrus bred from mandarin and orange, comes into season from winter into early spring. Its zest and juice go into a cream cheese filling along with sour cream, which is poured over a buttered cracker-crumb base and baked. The peel's aroma is at its clearest when the bars are cold.
Split one open and you get orange kabocha crumb with white ribbons of cream cheese running through it. The cream cheese goes on unsweetened and stays tangy against the sweet, cinnamon-spiced batter.
Sweet rice flour in a dense cheesecake batter gives it a faint mochi-like chew. Only part of the roasted soybean powder, the coating on injeolmi rice cakes, goes into the batter; the rest is rubbed with melted butter into a crumble that bakes crisp on top, putting the nutty flavor in two separate layers. After a full day in the fridge, the soybean aroma comes through more clearly.
Folded meringue lifts the batter, and a slow bake at 150°C in a hot water bath lets it cook gently. The cake dissolves almost weightlessly on the tongue. A slight sink after it leaves the oven is normal, and an overnight rest in the fridge spreads the moisture evenly for a silkier slice.
Mugwort powder is stirred into a dark chocolate brownie batter, and a swirl of cream cheese loosened with cream runs across the top. Both the herb and the chocolate lean bitter, so the tang of the cream cheese is what keeps each square from tasting heavy.
With 680 g of cream cheese, this is a heavy cheesecake, nothing like a soufflé cheesecake, and a fork sinks into it slowly. The graham cracker crust gets a bake of its own before the filling goes in. The cake bakes in a water bath and then cools slowly in the switched-off oven with the door slightly open.
Small cubes of cream cheese go into a batter made with grapeseed oil, and they stay as distinct pockets after baking. Omija syrup flavors the batter and is brushed thinly over the warm tops straight out of the oven for a reddish sheen.
No yeast and no butter folds: this dough is just flour with cream cheese and butter worked in, then chilled until firm enough to roll. Apricot jam, finely chopped walnuts and cinnamon sugar are spread over each round, which is cut into 12 wedges and rolled into crescents, 24 in total. If the dough cracks at the edges while rolling, give it a minute to soften rather than forcing it.