Your intrepid intern decided last night to put her money where her mouth is (about $28 in fact; even cheap Irish Cream is still kind of pricey if you're a broke college student) and make the Irish Cream Cheese Cake recipe below. After writing about it, thinking about it, and salivating all over my desk, it had to be made. I neeeeddeed it. Overall, the recipe was a smashing success, but as with anything that is good and truly worth indulging in, it was a little bit of an adventure:
First piece of advice: If you decide to make cheesecake--although, I guess this could be true for any sort of complex recipe--don't wait to do it until 9:00 on Monday night. You will be tired, you will be cranky, and you will wonder why the heck the darn chocolate isn't melting faster! You will snap at your boyfriend when he isn't whipping the cream properly and by the end, you will be sweaty and wondering "What chocolaty demon possessed me to do this!"
But I digress....so instead of doing it late at night after a long day of babysitting, interning, dishes, etc., plan in advance. This new and revolutionary baking technique allows you to purchase the needed ingredients the day before, get 8 to 9 hours of sleep, and wake up refreshed and ready to bake the next day. Otherwise, you'll be standing in the booze section of Kroger at 8:30 p.m., tiredly staring at an insurmountable wall of liquor, searching desperately for Irish Cream, muttering to yourself like a crazy person, and getting weird looks from people, only to find that it's been staring you in the face the whole time. This recipe is not overly complex, but it does take some time. So, if you have to get up early the next day or it's just been a long day, pace yourself. Professional chefs use a technique called "mise-en-place", which means to have everything measured and prepared before you even start cooking. Do this the night before. Plan ahead. Besides, if you start cooking later in the evening, you won't get to eat until the next day because you have to let the cheesecake chill for at least two hours. So what's the point? Although, I do admit it was fairly tempting to grab a piece at one in the morning...
Second piece of advice: Don't skimp on the chocolate chip cookies for the crust. The more crushed up cookies the better! My sous-chef (a very patient boyfriend who was kindly following all of my orders without question) didn't crush up quite enough of the cookies. I thought we would have more than enough, but I struggled to cover the bottom of the pie dish. This could also be because I didn't use enough butter. The moral of this story: use your measuring spoons kids! Unless you're measuring Irish Cream. Then just eyeball it. And be generous. Then pour yourself a glass for all of your hard work.
In conclusion, I honestly have not seen the final product yet. It has been chilling in the fridge overnight and I'm super pumped to go home and dig in tonight. If I can get my camera working, I will put up some pictures so that everyone will be inspired to make their own. Who knows, maybe I'll bring in the leftovers for the lucky ladies at Young Audiences to sample!
Who are we kidding? There won't be leftovers.
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