Piece of Cake



Dan's Birthday Cheesecake

      I know I should know better.  I actually thought of making things easy on myself.  I told myself it was okay to pick up a cake for my husband's birthday this year since it was in the middle of the week and he had a meeting that night so we weren't going to have much time for a big celebration that night.  I was out at lunch with a friend on Friday and saw that our local coffeehouse sells cheesecakes.  I e-mailed them to see if I could order one.  In the meantime, I remembered that I had a healthy recipe for cheesecake in a cookbook at home.  I decided to go ahead and make the effort to have a homemade cake.  Plus, I googled the Cheesecake Factory and I could make this whole cake for the price of one slice of theirs. 
     The cookbook suggested a cranberry-raspberry sauce, but I wasn't sure how that would be received.  I decided to save my fresh cranberries for Thanksgiving and made a strawberry-raspberry sauce variation instead.  I used regular cottage cheese instead of lowfat. I opted for the food processor rather than the blender. My cake baked up shorter than I expected, but I used a wider springform pan than recommended in the cookbook. The cake was very popular.  I had to grab the last slice off the table to share over tea in the morning with my favorite blogger: http://cleaninguptheclutter.blogspot.com/.

Cheesecake
from: Fat Flush Cookbook by Anne Louise Gittleman

1 pound 2 percent cottage cheese
1 cup mashed ripe banana
2 packets Stevia Plus
Juice of 1 lemon
4 eggs, beaten
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preaheat oven to 350 degrees. Place cottage cheese in a blender and blend until smooth. Add mashed banana, lemon juice and Stevia Plus and blend until mixed. Beat eggs one at a time and add to the mixture, blending well after each addition. Pour the mixture into a lightly greased (use butter), 8-inch springform pan. Bake for 35 minutes. Remove from oven and loosen cake from sides of pan with a knife. Cool and then chill for several hours or overnight before serving.

Quick Cran-Raspberry Sauce (also from Fat Flush Cookbook)

1/2 cup cranberries
1/2 cup raspberries
1/2 teaspoon orange zest
3/4 teaspoon Stevia Plus

Place all ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth. Heat in a saucepan for about 2 minutes or until hot. Serves 1.

My Stawberry-Raspberry Sauce
2 cups frozen raspberries
2 cups frozen strawberries
2 packets PureVia (Stevia)
3 Tablespoons Orange Juice

Thaw berries for 2 minutes in the microwave. Blend all ingredients in the food processor adding just enough orange juice to moisten the berries. Place berry sauce in pastry bag and dot on plate for serving or decorate cake.  This produced a large quantity of sauce to use up on another project later.