Cheesecake - Alaskified!

Mr EA's birthday was this past week, and in addition to cooking a favorite meal, I also made him his favorite cake for desert.  As it happens, his favorite cake is cheesecake, and his favorite form of it is little mini individual cheesecakes.  We arrived at this conclusion after years of me making a cheesecake, then him not eating it quickly enough, and me having to throw 1/4 of it away, followed by weeping and lamentations.  By making the little mini cheesecakes, I can freeze most of them, and he can thaw them out and have one whenever he wants. 
     The recipe I use is from an old recipe book I got from Kraft/Philadelphia Cream Cheese, entitled Ultimate Philly Cream Cheese Cheesecakes.  Guess what it is about! I will go ahead and post the recipe, because this book is at least 1.5 decades old, and possibly older. 

Philly 3-step Mini Cheesecakes
2 packages (8 oz. each) of Philadelphia Brand cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup of sugar
1/2 tsp. of vanilla
2 eggs
2 packages (4 oz each) of Keebler Ready-Crust single serve graham cracker Pie Crusts (total of 12 crusts)
Optional: whipped cream, little candies, whatever other junk you like to put on cheesecake. 

Special New Alaskan Addition:
1 Tbsp. birch syrup

Preheat oven to 350 F.  Mix cream cheese, sugar and vanilla until well blended.  Add eggs, mix until blended again.  Pour mixture into pie crusts.  Divide the birch syrup between the cakes, pouring a little into each. When the birch syrup has been poured over the pies, swirl or stripe it in, using a table knife to create whatever patterns you like best.  Bake for 20 minutes or until centers are set.  Cool cakes and refrigerate. 

Result, 12 delicious little single serve treats!  Also, we like to use the lightened cream cheese to make it a little less fatty, but you know, sometimes you have to live a little. 

Birch, birch, birch

We were recently introduced to birch syrup, one of the few truly Alaskan specialties that is also commercially available. (You try finding whale blubber.) Although we had been vaguely aware of its existence for a little while, we just kept getting distracted and forgetting to try it. However, we finally tried some at the Alaska State Fair, and quickly became devotees.

Based on my extensive research, which consisted of talking to the lady staffing the birch booth at the fair and roughly 10 minutes of web searching, I can tell you that birch syrup is pretty rare, is produced by very few manufacturers, and takes twice as much raw sap to make as maple syrup. I can also tell you that is very tasty!

Birch syrup is darker and stonger than maple, and also somewhat bittersweet. If I needed to compare it another sweetener, I would say it is like if maple and molasses had a baby...

It is delicious as a sweetner, but that's only a start. As with maple syrup, birch can be added to mustard and other similar substances, and also be turned into various candies.

One of our favorites is birch caramel, which is available for order here.

This has quickly become a favorite treat for our loved ones elsewhere in the country as well. We have standing orders from family members for these caramels - and we like to keep them around our house, as well.

In honor of being Alaskans, we adapted one of Mr EA's favorite recipes, Black Diamond Steak, to include birch syrup. We call it Black Dimond - did we mis-spell? No. Click the link for the story of Anthony J. Dimond. There's a lot of stuff named for him around here. And here's one more thing!

Anyway, without further ado...

Black Dimond Steak

For the marinade:

2 Tbsp. corn oil

1/4 cup soy sauce

1/4 cup birch syrup

2 Tbsp. brown sugar

2 Tbsp. vinegar

1 1/2 tsp. ginger-root, fresh, minced

1 pinch garlic powder

1 lb. New York strip steak

Mix together marinade ingredients. Immerse steak in the mixture, making sure to keep it covered. Marinade at least 6 hours, but overnight is better. Grill to desired doneness.

Enjoy!