Easy New York Cheesecake
This new york cheesecake is smooth, creamy, and bakes with no water bath and no cracks! We found the perfect classic cheesecake recipe that you will keep in your recipe book for life.
Ingredients
Crust:
- 150 g Graham crackers or digestive biscuits
- 80 g Butter
- 2 tablespoon Sugar
Cheesecake filling:
- 900 g Cream cheese
- 2 teaspoon Vanilla extract
- 1 ½ cups Sugar
- 4 Eggs
- 4 tablespoon Cornstarch or flour
- 200 g Sour cream
- 1 teaspoon Lemon zest
- ¼ teaspoon Kosher salt
Instructions
- Prepare a 9-inch springform pan with parchment paper, and preheat an oven to 180c (350f).
Make the crust:
- Pulse graham crackers in a food processor until fine crumbs form. If you don’t have a food processor on hand, place the crackers in a Ziplock bag and smash the crackers with a cup until fine crumbs form.
- Into a small to medium mixing bowl, add the graham crackers crumbs, sugar, and melted butter. Mix with a spoon until the crumbs are coated with butter.
- Transfer the crumbs into a prepared 9-inch cake pan, pressing evenly and firmly into the pan.
- Bake the crust in a 180c (350f) preheated oven for 5-8 minutes. Keep an eye on the crust and make sure it doesn’t burn. Take the crust out of the oven and let it cool to room temperature.
- Lower the temperature to 140c (280f).
Make the filling:
- In a big mixing bowl, add the room temperature cream cheese and mix with an electric hand mixer until the cream cheese is creamy.
- Add the sugar, lemon zest, and vanilla extract and mix until the mixture is creamy and smooth.
- Lower the hand mixer speed to low, and add each egg at a time. This step stops the cheesecake batter from overbeating. Overbeating can cause a weird cheesecake texture and stops the cake from cracking.
- Add the flour (we suggest sifting the flour) into the mixture and beat it on medium speed until the mixture is just combined. Make sure you don’t overbeat the mixture.
- Pour the cheesecake batter over the crust, and release air bubbles by tapping the pan onto a flat surface.
- Bake the cheesecake in a 140c (280f) for about an hour or until the edges of the cheesecake are set, but the middle is a bit jiggly.
- Open the oven door halfway, and let the cheesecake cool to room temperature for 1-2 hours. After the cheesecake is cooled, wrap the cheesecake with a plastic wrap tightly, and place the cheesecake in the fridge to cool completely for at least 5 hours.
- Run a thin knife around the edges of the cake to loosen it from the pan. Carefully release the springform, slice, and enjoy!
Notes
Make sure that you are using room-temperature cream cheese in this recipe, this step makes it easier to mix the cream cheese with no unnecessary lumps, we don’t want that.
Use a springform tin. We use springform tins for all of our cheesecake recipes. This makes sure that your cake will be easy to release from the pan.
Use high-fat cream cheese or the well-known Philadelphia cream cheese. Using full-fat cream cheese ensures you that your cheesecake will be stable and will not crack.
Let your cheesecake cool in the fridge for at least 5 hours. We know it’s very hard to resist eating this delicious cheesecake right away, but you have to let the cheesecake cool and set in the pan. We like to let the cheesecake sit in the fridge overnight.
For a smooth and creamy cheesecake, make sure that you are using room-temperature ingredients. Before you begin to make this cheesecake, make sure that your cream cheese is completely soft, and that your eggs are at room temperature.
Don’t overbeat the mixture! It's really easy to overbeat the mixture, and that is one of the most common mistakes. To avoid overbeating your mixture, make sure that you lower the speed of the hand mixer and add each egg at a time.
Scrape down the sides of the bowl frequently to ensure that you have a homogeneous mixture that has no cream cheese lumps.
Don't open the oven door before the cake is fully baked or about to be baked! Drastic changes in the temperature of the cake while baking can cause the cake to collapse or to crack.
Nutrition
Calories: 640kcalCarbohydrates: 53gProtein: 9gFat: 45gSaturated Fat: 25gPolyunsaturated Fat: 2gMonounsaturated Fat: 12gTrans Fat: 1gCholesterol: 185mgSodium: 523mgPotassium: 199mgFiber: 1gSugar: 40gVitamin A: 1628IUVitamin C: 1mgCalcium: 132mgIron: 1mg
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!