We do a lot of cooking in my house, never more so than during this pandemic. Usually we make recipes we find online with minor adaptations, but we had a hard time finding a cheesecake recipe that required minimal oven time (because it’s hot) and would only make two small cheesecakes. So we took inspiration from mini cheesecake and no-bake recipes that we found, and this recipe is the end result. And they came out fantastic!
Required tools:
- Two 3” metal rings (at least 2” deep) or similar small dish
- Hand mixer, whisk, or stand mixer
Ingredients
Graham cracker crust
- 3 graham crackers
- 3 tbsp butter
Cream cheese filling & whipped topping
- 4 ounces cream cheese (room temp) 1
- 1/2 cup heavy cream
- 1 1/2 tbsp powdered sugar
- 1 1/2 tbsp granulated sugar 2
- 1/2 tbsp yogurt
- splash of vanilla
Recipe
Graham cracker crust
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.
Prepare the metal rings by putting them on a cookie sheet and lining with a ring of parchment paper. I also lined the cookie sheet with a silpat.
Melt the butter and crumble the graham crackers. Pour the melted butter over the graham crackers and combine. Divide the buttery graham cracker crumble into the two metal rings, and press down until level and evenly compacted.
Bake the crusts for 6-8 minutes, and let cool completely.
Cream cheese filling & whipped topping
Whip the heavy cream with the hand mixer in a medium bowl until soft peaks form. Add the powdered sugar and continue to whip until stiff peaks form.
Combine cream cheese and granulated sugar in a separate bowl, and whip until smooth. You may need to scrape down the sides with a spatula to make sure they are well combined. Add yogurt and vanilla, and continue to whip until smooth. Gently fold in half of the whipped cream; reserve the rest as a whipped topping for the cheesecakes.
Divide the creamy cheese mixture over the two cooled crusts; smooth out the top of the surface. Refrigerate overnight. 3
Serve with your homemade whipped topping and fresh berries.
Additional options for toppings:
- Add a spoonful of jam to the top of each cheesecake, and swirl lightly before refrigerating.
- Make a simple ganache with heavy cream and chocolate chips. Heat the heavy cream and pour over the same volume of chocolate chips. Let it cool, and add a spoonful to the top of each cheesecake before refrigerating.
Notes
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Following the advice of a few reference recipes, I left the cream cheese sitting out on the counter for 4 hours so that it was fully room temp when I used it. ↩
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I was out of regular granulated sugar, so I made this with brown sugar and it was still delicious! ↩
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I chilled these in the fridge overnight; you could possibly get away with chilling it for ~6 hours. DO NOT FREEZE - several websites with no-bake cheesecake recipes warned that the end result is much less creamy if you freeze them. ↩