Cheesecakes are not one of my favorite dessert foods. It’s the cream cheese that I don’t like. I like cream cheese when it’s sweetened, like in frosting, or when mixed into muffins, but I don’t like it on its own or when the flavor of the cream cheese is too prominent.
This month’s Taste Of Home magazine featured quite a few cheesecake recipes and they all looked amazing to me. It made me wish that I liked cheesecakes! I decided to try one of the recipes; maybe my tastes had changed since I last had cheesecake. I chose the pumpkin cheesecake, because I love pumpkin.
Now, I’ve never made a cheesecake before, so I was entering new territory! The process of putting it together was extremely easy. I was looking forward to having a cheesecake that was as beautiful and yummy-looking as was in the picture in the magazine.
But, it ended up being not as pretty…
The graham cracker crust was soggy, for one. Second, the topping was too brown. It just didn’t have the mouth-watering look like the photo of the pumpkin cheesecake slice in the magazine!
The taste of the cheesecake though was to die for! I loved it! I couldn’t detect the taste of the cream cheese, although my mom said she could. To me, it tasted like a pumpkin pie. The brown sugar and chopped walnut crunchy topping was a great contrast in texture.
By the looks of the topping, it looks like I over-baked it. The recipe said to bake until the center was set, but I realized I didn’t know what it would look like when the center was set because I’ve never made a cheesecake before! It was still slightly wobbly in the center, but I didn’t want to bake it any longer because the topping looked over-done.
I will definitely be trying to make this cheesecake again. For something different at Thanksgiving this year, I would highly recommend this recipe!
- Crust:
- 2 cups graham cracker crumbs
- ¼ cup sugar
- 6 tablespoons butter, melted
- Filling:
- 3 packages (8 oz. each) cream cheese, softened
- ¾ cup sugar
- ¾ cup packed dark brown sugar
- 1 can (15 oz.) solid-pack pumpkin
- ¼ cup heavy whipping cream
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon ground cloves
- 5 eggs, lightly beaten
- Topping:
- 6 tablespoons butter, softened
- 1 cup packed dark brown sugar
- 1 cup chopped walnuts
- Place a greased 9-in. springform pan on a double thickness of heavy-duty aluminum foil (about 18 in. square). Securely wrap foil around pan. In a small bowl, combine graham cracker crumbs and sugar; stir in melted butter. Press onto the bottom and 1 inch up the sides of prepared pan.
- In a large bowl, beat cream cheese and sugars until smooth. Beat in the pumpkin, cream, cinnamon and cloves until blended. Add eggs; beat on low speed just until combined. Pour over crust. Place springform pan in a large baking pan; add 1 inch of hot water to larger pan.
- Bake at 325F for 1 hour. For topping, in a small bowl, combine butter and brown sugar. Stir in walnuts. Carefully sprinkle over hot cheesecake. Bake 30 minutes longer or until center is just set. Remove springform pan from water bath. Cool on wire rack for 10 minutes. Carefully run a knife around edge of pan to loosen; cool 1 hour longer. Refrigerate overnight.
If you enjoyed this recipe, please leave a comment, hit up one of those stars to rate it, and be sure to tag any photos with #sweetestkitchen on Instagram if you made this recipe! I'd love to see what you've created!
Mmm wow this looks tasty, I love your blog, I’ve still yet to try anything of a pumpkin nature in terms of dessert!! What’s it like?
You have to try it! It’s mainly accompanied with pumpkin pie spices like cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, allspice; warm and spicy. It’s the perfect definition of autumn-themed foods!
wow looks scrumptious! Too bad Thanksgiving is over (well, ours in Canada anyway), it looks like a fun change from the reg pumpkin pie. I like cheesecake, but I’m not a crazy fan of it. But this looks absolutely delish.
Thanks for sharing the recipe.
That’s what ice cream is for! It hides all the imperfections. Looks fabulous!
This looks so delicious! I’m actually a huge fan of cheesecake, and I love trying out different flavored cheesecake. This one looks like a winner!
pumpkins are so yummmy…yummy..yummy..kool blog will be back!
I have found that they never look as pretty as in the magazines – mostly because the magazine food is not always real! As long as it tastes good, though, and this definitely sounds (and looks!) like it tastes good!
Now I haven’t seen the photo in the magazine, but yours look delicious to me! Too bad about the soggy crust, though. I am not a cheesecake baker, but not because I don’t love to eat them, but because they scare me a little 😉
That cheesecake looks so good!
I think it’s plenty pretty! My favorite pumpkin cheesecake comes from the Libby’s recipe. Tray that one next time and see what you think?
I haven’t seen the Libby’s recipe; it’ll be hard to tear myself away from this Taste of Home recipe, but I’ll try to keep an open mind and try another pumpkin cheesecake recipe soon! 😀
I love pumpkin cheesecake. This topping sounds great, I think I will add it to mine the next time. Thanks for the inspiration.
You’re welcome!
Hmmm, me thinks you’re being too rough on yourself! (Love the topping.) I thought you did a great first time job.
Bummer about the crust though.
~ingrid
Thanks! It’s fine though, I mean it still tastes great, so I’m not too concerned about the crust being soggy! 🙂
I’ve never had pumpkin cheesecake before! But this one looks wonderful, and if a non-cheesecake fan liked it, I’m sure I would too! I have a brand-new, never before used springform pan just waiting for this recipe 🙂
I would highly suggest breaking in that springform pan with this recipe! If you do make it, let me know how it goes. 🙂
I just made the same recipe from the Taste of Home magazine, my topping looks just like yours. I was disappointed too because the magazine looks so nice. Oh well, hopefully it will taste good.
I made this for Thanksgiving this year and it turned out AWESOME!!! I think it looked really pretty and it tasted divine; and I don’t even like cheesecake! The only change I made was I substituted pecans for the walnuts. I’m not a huge fan of walnuts but the pecans tasted great1