Daring Bakers Challenge - The Most Decedant Cheesecake Ever!

In college, my roommates and I used to trek down to The Cheesecake Factory to treat ourselves to a delicious slice of cheesecake. The Oreo cookie and carrot cake were fan favorites. The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake as the Challenge. Since I LOVE cheesecake, I actually had trouble deciding what flavor would be my inspiration for the challenge. My solution...let Hubby choose! I sent him to The Cheesecake Factory website and told him to pick his favorite. He chose "Adam's Peanut Butter Cup Fudge Ripple". The menu describes it as "creamy cheesecake swirled with caramel, peanut butter, Butterfingers and Reeses Peanut Butter Cups". Sounds decadent, right? Oh my! I decided to make this dessert for Easter to share with the whole family, and also to ensure that I wouldn't singlehandedly eat an entire cheesecake on my own!

Well I had my inspiration, so I got to work. Here's the layering I used: I started with a crust made with the gluten-free chocolate cookie wafers. I used Newman's O Gluten-free cookies. I scraped out the creamy filling because I didn't want my crust to be to hard. I crushed a Butterfinger candy bar and sprinkled that on the cookie crust. The next layer was the cheesecake, and I stuck to the recipe for this one. I topped it was a layer of chocolate ganache (see recipe below), crumbled Reeses Peanut Butter Cups and a drizzle of caramel.
Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake:

crust:
2 cups / 180 g graham cracker crumbs (or the chocolate wafers)
1 stick / 4 oz butter, melted
2 tbsp. / 24 g sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract

cheesecake:
3 sticks of cream cheese, 8 oz each (total of 24 oz) room temperature
1 cup / 210 g sugar
3 large eggs
1 cup / 8 oz heavy cream
1 tbsp. lemon juice
1 tbsp. vanilla extract (or the innards of a vanilla bean)

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F . Begin to boil a large pot of water for the water bath.

2. Mix together the crust ingredients and press into your preferred pan. You can press the crust just into the bottom, or up the sides of the pan too - baker's choice. Set crust aside.

3. Combine cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of a stand-mixer (or in a large bowl if using a hand-mixer) and cream together until smooth. Add eggs, one at a time, fully incorporating each before adding the next. Make sure to scrape down the bowl in between each egg. Add heavy cream, vanilla, lemon juice, and alcohol and blend until smooth and creamy.

4. Pour batter into prepared crust and tap the pan on the counter a few times to bring all air bubbles to the surface. Place pan into a larger pan and pour boiling water into the larger pan until halfway up the side of the cheesecake pan. If cheesecake pan is not airtight, cover bottom securely with foil before adding water.

5. Bake 45 to 55 minutes, until it is almost done - this can be hard to judge, but you're looking for the cake to hold together, but still have a lot of jiggle to it in the center. You don't want it to be completely firm at this stage. Close the oven door, turn the heat off, and let rest in the cooling oven for one hour. This lets the cake finish cooking and cool down gently enough so that it won't crack on the top. After one hour, remove cheesecake from oven and lift carefully out of water bath. Let it finish cooling on the counter, and then cover and put in the fridge to chill. Once fully chilled, it is ready to serve.

Pan note: The creator of this recipe used to use a spring form pan, but no matter how well she wrapped the thing in tin foil, water would always seep in and make the crust soggy. Now she uses one of those 1-use foil "casserole" shaped pans from the grocery store. They're 8 or 9 inches wide and really deep, and best of all, water-tight. When it comes time to serve, just cut the foil away.

Prep notes: While the actual making of this cheesecake is a minimal time commitment, it does need to bake for almost an hour, cool in the oven for an hour, and chill overnight before it is served. Please plan accordingly!

Chocolate Ganache
Note: Because the ganache hardens as it cools, you should make it right before you intend to use it. Please be careful when caramelising the sugar and then adding the cream. It may splatter and boil. I placed a piece of foil over the pan and poured the cream into a hole in the middle of the foil to prevent splattering.

Ingredients:
4 Tb granulated sugar
2/3 + 1Tb heavy cream
5 oz dark chocolate, finely chopped
3 Tb + 1/2 tsp unsalted butter softened

1. Make a caramel: Using the dry method, melt the sugar by spreading it in an even layer in a small saucepan with high sides. heat over medium-high heat, watching it carefully as the sugar begins to melt. Never stir the mixture. As the sugar starts to melt, swirl the pan occasionally to allow the sugar to melt evenly. Cook to dark amber color.
2. While the sugar is melting, heat the cream until boiling. Pour cream into the caramel and stir thoroughly. Be very careful as it may splatter and boil.
3. Pour the hot caramel-milk mixture over the dark chocolate. Wait 30 seconds and stir until smooth.
4. Add the softened butter and whip hard and fast. the chocolate should be smooth and shiny.

I actually had trouble with leaking from the water bath, but after allowing the cheesecake to sit in the fridge overnight that crust held together perfectly. Everyone raved about the dessert and Easter, and even declared it the "best cheesecake they had ever tasted". This delicious recipe is one that I will definitely make again, at another family event because I'm sure I could have polished off about half of the cake if given the chance!