Happy Quarter Century, Brother!

Yesterday my oldest brother turned a little older, and he being the wise man that he is requested Carrot Cake Cheesecake for dessert. After unsuccessfully looking for a recipe online, I took a leaf out of my mom's book, said screw it, and just assembled a recipe myself based on my go-to carrot cake and cheesecake recipes. It goes a little something like this:

Cheesecake
adapted from McCall's Best Cheesecake to make the Carrot Cake Cheesecake AND another little cheesecake, so if you don't want an extra cheesecake, divide this in half-ish (but come on, who doesn't want extra cheesecake?)

2 lbs cream cheese (that's 4 8oz packages), room temperature
5 eggs
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/3 cup sugar
pinch salt

Beat the cream cheese in a large bowl until creamy. Add eggs, vanilla, sugar, and salt and continue beating until thoroughly combined. If you're making an extra cheesecake, pour half the batter into a graham cracker crust (homemade or storebought, whatever fancies you) and bake in a preheated to 375F oven for 30-35 minutes. Set the rest of the batter aside to make the carrot cake.

Carrot Cake

1 cup sugar
3 eggs
3/4 cup oil, plain greek yogurt, or a mixture of the two
1 1/4 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp nutmeg
1/8 tsp cloves
1/4 tsp ginger
1/4 cup chopped walnuts
1/4 cup sweetened shredded coconut
3/4 cup apple, finely chopped
1 1/2 cups carrot, grated

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Beat sugar and egg together, then slowly add oil/yogurt. In a separate bowl, combine flour, salt, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and ginger, then sift over sugar mixture. Mix until mostly combined, then add walnuts, coconut, apple, and carrot and mix together. Grease and flour a 9 in springform pan, then place pan inside a bigger, shallow pan. This is not for a water bath! It's to contain the goopy, drippy carrot cake batter that will inevitably seep out the bottom of the pan, catching your oven on fire without something to catch it. I'm not speaking from experience... just offering foresight. Yeahhh... Anyway, pour your carrot cake batter into the springform pan, then spoon the cheesecake batter on top of that and spread it evenly. Put the whole thing in the oven and set your timer to 40-45 minutes. Make sure the top of the cheesecake doesn't get too brown as this is a sign of overbaking, oh no! When your timer alerts you that the cake is done, remove it (the cake, not the timer) from the oven and put it somewhere to cool down. Once the cake is room temperature, put the whole thing in the fridge. If you accidentally leave it uncovered and become worried that the top has dried out too much (again, not speaking from experience, merely foresight), make this topping:

6 oz cream cheese
4 oz sour cream
1/8-1/4 cup sugar, depending on preference
pinch salt
2-3 tablespoons whiskey/bourbon/whatever alcohol tastes best to you, OR 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Cream the cream cheese and sour cream together, then add the sugar, salt, and alcohol and beat until thoroughly combined. Taste the topping and adjust as needed. Use a knife to go around the edges of the cake to loosen the sides from the pan, then dump the topping atop the cake and smooth with the back of a spoon because a knife would never work at this angle. When you're ready to serve, remove the side of the pan and you're good to go. Store covered in the fridge.


And here's what your extra cheesecake might look like, assuming you made one and then took a crappy cell phone picture of it: