Daring Bakers in April: Cheesecake Pops

April 27, 2008 at 2:10 pm | Posted in cakes & tortes, cheesecakes, daring bakers, groups, sweet things | 51 Comments

I must admit that I almost skipped making these cheesecake pops, this month’s Daring Bakers challenge.  Even though I went out and searched around for lollipop sticks at the beginning of the month, I hadn’t really been in a cheesecake mood.  Then I realized that the photo opportunities here were too good to be missed!  The recipe, from the book Sticky, Chewy, Messy, Gooey by Jill O’Connor, was chosen by co-hostesses Deborah from Taste and Tell and Elle from Feeding My Enthusiasms. 

I found a recipe calling for five bars of cream cheese to be a bit much to swallow (literally).  I scaled the recipe way back to just one bar and baked it in a small loaf pan.  I put the batter together my favorite way– in the food processor.  As long as all the ingredients are room temperature, you will never get a lump.  It baked up nicely, but even the tiny amount that I made took about 20 minutes longer than the suggested time.

After a night in the fridge, I used an ice cream scoop to form the set cheesecake into rough balls, and put them into the freezer for half an hour before reshaping them a bit.  They still came out looking a bit…ummm….individual.  Not that that’s a bad thing!  The sticks are really wooden craft sticks (I had no luck finding the paper ones here), and I loved their fun colors.  The packet said non-toxic, so let’s just hope that’s right!

I’m not embarrassed to say that hundreds and thousands are my favorite cake decoration!  Just looking at them makes me smile! 

I decided to roll a couple in some almond cookie crumbs mixed with a little cinnamon to get kind a cheesecake crust thing going on.  In the center of these ones, I managed to hide a blob of strawberry jam.  Sneaky! 

The cuteness factor is unbelievable, and they taste pretty good too!  Just what I needed put myself into a cheesecake mood!  Thanks Deborah and Elle!  You can find the recipe for the pops on Deborah’s site.  I’ve looked at a bunch of posts, and the DBers did a beautiful job this month, so please check out the DB blogroll!