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Howie and Mindy's Creamy Cheesecake
Family friends Howie and Mindy Feinberg brought this cheesecake, which they baked together, to my sister and brother-in-law's house for the Jewish holidays. They billed it as Junior's cheesecake, which has the reputation of being one of the best, if not the best, in New York.
"No way is it Junior's," I said just by looking at it. "For a start, Junior's cheesecake has a sponge layer base and this cake has a graham cracker base." Then I tasted it. "This tastes as lush and lightly sweetened as the Junior's cheesecake I remember from many years ago, but it doesn't taste like what they make now. Where'd you get the recipe?"
"It's a recipe from Bob Lappe (the restaurant critic) and we clipped it from a newspaper or magazine years ago," said Howie. "Well, don't always believe what you read in the paper," was my response. "I'm going to compare it to the recipe in the new Junior's cookbook."
Sure enough, this recipe is very different from the one Junior's says it makes at its store on Flatbush Ave., Brooklyn, and mail-orders around the world. The official Junior's recipe has only slightly less cream cheese, but double the eggs, double the cornstarch, more sugar, more cream, and much, much more vanilla. (Okay, it wouldn't hurt Howie and Mindy's cake if it had a tad more vanilla, too, although I never missed it as I ate too much of it.) The baking temperature and time is totally different, too.
Wherever this recipe came from originally doesn't matter anymore; although I do believe, judging by the irregular amount of cream cheese and odd 7/8 cup sugar, that it was broken down from a larger commercial formula. More to the point, it's incredibly creamy and delicious. It's my ideal cheesecake, even though I still love my own recipe using whipped cream cheese. You can find that one on this web-site by clicking on the section devoted to "Cooking In A Small Kitchen," my first and now very out of print cookbook.
Howie and Mindy Feinberg's Creamy Cheesecake
Makes 1 7-inch cake
Graham cracker crumbs
1 pound, 14 ounces cream cheese
7/8 cup sugar
2 tablespoons corn starch (mix with sugar)
1 extra large egg
1/2 cup heavy cream
3/4 teaspoon vanilla
Lightly butter a 7 inch springform pan. Lightly cover the bottom with graham cracker crumbs.
Thoroughly cream together the remaining ingredients. Pour into the prepared pan.
Bake on the middle shelf of a preheated 420-degree oven for 30 to 40 minutes. If the top turns golden brown before baking time is complete, gently place a sheet of foil across the top of the cheesecake and continue baking.
Remove immediately from the oven. Cool on a rack, then place it in refrigerator for at least 3 hours.
