Cheesecake Recipes & More From Cheesecakes To Go

If someone had told me this story, I wouldn’t have believed it. But from the get-go, I was a witness and before the beginning had become yesterday’s news, my best friend and I observed the metamorphosis of Paula – Pudgy Paula, we called her which wasn’t kind but hey, between us, Best Friend and I prefer straight talk.

Pudgy Paula and Chunky Charlene were friends, not exactly bosom buddies but they were endowed with the obvious qualifications and one day, excited because their English term papers received the highest marks, they hugged. The class clown who considered himself a wag could not stifle the urge to blurt out his observation, “Look! Bosom buddies!” Of course, Pudgy Paula and Chunky Charlene blushed, squealed, and ran in opposite directions. They were of a certain age that bursts easily into tears. They were not quite 16.

But the bosom buddies jibe became the catalyst for Pudgy Paula and Chunky Charlene to lose weight. Because diets are boring to follow and tiring to hear about (especially the banning of cheesecake in all its succulent variations), I’ll cut to the chase. After four months of calisthenics and counting calories, Chunky Charlene was no more. From out of a cocoon of baby fat, she emerged a butterfly – lithe and curvy, a poster teen brimming confidence. She glided and whirled. She tossed her hair. She drove the boys nuts.

Pudgy Paula came down one size, all over. She had a waist but not by much. Her body was well-toned but it didn’t stimulate boys’ fantasies because she did not fit their idealized image of a sexy girl. Paula was not the itsy-bitsy bikini type. She was a solid citizen, a dependable friend, and not a happy camper. When she walked, she didn’t skim over the earth; she plodded. Paula was down in the dumps.

She sank lower when she tried out for the softball team. Charlene made the cut because the coach could detect a latent talent capable of development. But Paula was another story. She couldn’t hit. She couldn’t throw. She couldn’t catch. She couldn’t run. The coach appointed her assistant manager and made her responsible for the oversized cooler and its contents – an energy drink of debatable nutritional distinction. Paula lavished attention on the jug, keeping it stocked and chilled, and spotlessly hygienic. But her shoulders sagged and her eyes were lusterless.

At the second game, an error gave birth to a makeover of extreme distinction. A solid hit into foul territory clipped the manager’s left knee and put her on the ground, writhing with pain. Word came back from the ER that following surgery, she would be on crutches for the rest of the season. The coach promoted Paula to manager. At first she was tentative. The makeover began when the coach handed her a clipboard. Paula accepted it; holding it by one corner, letting it hang down beside her leg. The coach asked her to make a note about sending flowers to the injured girl. Paula brought the clipboard up to where she could write on it, made the notation, and instead of letting the clipboard return to its ignominious lower level, she embraced the clipboard. So help me, it became part of her. I could see self-confidence coursing through her body. She stood taller. Her shoulders squared. Her eyes focused. She not only had a new job, everything about her body language proclaimed that she had a mission and, by golly, she would be the finest manager the softball team had ever had.

I said to Best Friend, “Chunky-no-more Paula has found her raison d’! Get a load of the clipboard dynamics!”

“Yeah,” she said. “Authority speaks!”

Throughout games and practices, she gripped the clipboard. Sometimes, the clipboard seemed to be attached to her. She consulted the forms it held; she made entries; she made notes. She was efficient. She was happy. Before our eyes, Paula had become a different girl.

She celebrated the intoxicating elation of feeling she belonged by stopping at a bakery where she chose a slice of key lime cheesecake, its filling the authentic sallow, pale yellow hue of real key limes, and whose flavor was just sweet enough not to be too sour, and sour enough not to be too sweet. She savored every bite.

“Paula,” I overheard Charlene say, “aren’t you afraid you’ll gain back the weight you lost?”

“Nope.”

And she never did. I’ve known her for 30 years; Best Friend and I were her bridal attendants. Charlene was her maid of honor. And except when she was pregnant, Paula’s weight never has fluctuated more than two or three pounds. She eats whatever she likes, and that includes cheesecake. She’s a handsome, confident, purposeful woman, thanks to a makeover that began from within.

– Scarlet O’Cheesecake

Gerry arrived at the assisted living wing of the multi-tasking facility for the warehousing of the aging with an expectancy reminiscent of the first day he went to school – excited, optimistic, but a tad apprehensive. He was a shadow of his former robust self – not as tall, not as much hair and now, instead of a deep auburn, it was ten different variations of salt and pepper. His purposeful stride was shortened, somewhat tentative, but – and he prided himself on this: he did not shuffle. That is, not yet. On some days the gold band he’d worn for almost 60 years fit snugly but on others, it slid around, a reminder that the day before he had drunk enough water, a good sign, one to emulate.

The lady who put that ring on his finger was gone; she slipped away – two years ago? Or was it last month? Gerry couldn’t remember. But he remembered her. Bernice. Bernie Baby. Beautiful Bernice. Heads turned when she walked by. His had snapped. He never tired of looking at her. When her body said she was an old woman, her eyes said otherwise. Those dark chocolate eyes with the golden flecks, the eyes he swam into, the eyes that spoke to him when the tubes made it impossible for her to communicate, the eyes that begged for peace, the eyes that for all their life together repeatedly declared, “I love you, Gerry. I love you.”

His new home was a studio apartment, the living area large enough to swing a couple of cats. Compared to what he was used to, the bedroom made him think of a monk’s cell, and he chuckled because as best as he could remember, he’d never seen a monk’s cell, and before he met Bernice, he’d never conducted himself like a monk. Being faithful to Bernice was easy. He honored his promise to keep himself only unto her as long as they both lived. Now his life was divided into two compartments – With Bernice and Without Bernice. At his new home, one of the many women residents he met was a saucy little widow with faded red hair. After cradling Bernice for all those years, especially after she became skin and bones, the little widow’s plump figure was rather invigorating. His daughter who visited often enough to suspect one of her father’s relationships was not platonic, asked him what it was like to bed a woman other than his wife, someone he wasn’t in love with. “Dad,” she said, “you’re having recreational sex with this widow.”

Gerry looked her square in the face and said, “Daughter, at my age, any sex is recreational!”

To Gerry, the apartment’s most attractive feature was a utilitarian galley kitchen, with a pass-through to a dining counter. Here Gerry could putter and experiment and forget he was a resident in one of those old folks places, designed to accommodate the body’s changing needs, decorated with artificial cheerfulness, a failed attempt to deny the approach of the inevitable.

Within a week, Gerry’s apartment became the most visited. Almost every day he baked – muffins for the morning, or for afternoon a plate of homemade cookies, brownies, or tarts. During the evenings, visitors had a choice of teas and sweets and always lively conversation, sometimes a game of cards, or reading aloud from one of Gerry’s many books. He still had a driver’s license and some days two or three rode with him to a mall or a restaurant or to the movies and occasionally a play. In appreciation of his hospitality, his new friends brought gifts – hanging plants, original artwork, a handmade throw, decorative pillows, and small appliances and other cooking aids that included a growing collection of baking pans and utensils. The apartment’s antiseptic look vanished.

Most excursions included stops at bookstores where after leafing through several cookbooks, Gerry usually purchased one or two. “One of these days” he exclaimed, “I’ll get it right! I’ll serve you the best damn cheesecake you’ve ever tasted!” Interest in his cheesecake experiments mounted. “I think I’ve almost got it!” he said. But then he reported that the filling was too firm or the filling was too soft or the flavor was off or the crust was too short or not short enough.

His friends tried to bolster his spirits. “Too soft? Then serve it with a spoon!”

Finally, he admitted defeat. His friends commiserated with him. “But,” he said, “stop in this evening because I guarantee you will not be disappointed.”

And they weren’t. A tray of small, individual cheesecakes in assorted flavors melted away any hints of senility or peevishness. “This is perfect!” everyone exclaimed. “You rascal! You’ve done it! Congratulations!”

“I can’t claim credit for this,” Gerry said. “I ordered it online yesterday from a website in Texas and FedEx delivered it this afternoon.”

His friends paid no attention. They didn’t care who made the mini cheesecakes or where they came from. They were too busy sampling each other’s choices.

“Oh, you’ve got to taste this one! It’s positively divine!”

From opposite sides of the room, Gerry and the little widow with the faded red hair smiled a silent signal that both understood. They thought no one noticed when they slipped out the door. That’s because they couldn’t see their friends’ smiles and winks.

– Scarlet O’Cheesecake

Joanie collapsed onto the couch and sighed, “Oh, thank you, all you saints and sinners, for helping us survive another Christmas!” No wonder she was exhausted. As usual, the home she shared with her husband, four children (two theirs plus one each from their previous marriages), dog, cat, fish and a crabby bird, was the gathering place for far-flung family. “They haven’t been flung far enough!” thought Joanie midweek when feeling particularly put upon.

Because more than human beings descended on their home.

By Christmas Eve, Joanie was already stressed out but not “just” from shopping and wrapping and cooking and baking but because everyone in the household was at various stages of an intestinal flu. The twins, age 4, in their Doctor Dentons, padded from couch to bed to bathroom clutching bowls, looking more like exotic beggars from some very short tribe than sick kids coping with churning bellies. Matt, invincible, slayer of dragons, her hero of heroes, was uprooted like a tree in a tornado; he had given up staying in bed and instead laid on the bathroom floor. The teens, Matt Jr., and Elly, were preternaturally quiet, a silence that forecast their bout with It was imminent. By the next afternoon, sure enough, they were bathroom ridden.

Into these chambers of horrors descended the Far Flungers, the jolly uncle and his ebullient wife bringing with them not only gifts beautifully wrapped by Santa’s elves (that’s the malarkey they tried to foist off onto The Twins) but another strain of It which included high fevers and sweats that drenched the guestroom bedding. Joanie divvied up her time between the kitchen and the laundry – making sure everyone was hydrated and keeping the washer and drier running almost ‘round the clock – and disinfecting the bathrooms.

As The Sickies became temporarily strong enough to venture forth from their bedrooms, they migrated to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator, cased the shelves, groaned, and headed into the family room. Joanie believed their food curiosity was based less on hunger and more on habit. They were a sorry bunch. During lulls in the illness’s more dramatic moments, The Twins colored at the kitchen counter and watched children’s programs on the small television. Matt paged through books he felt he should read to be well-informed but it was all his head could do to wrap itself around magazine short articles. The Teens spent their ambulatory minutes text messaging. The Far Flungers sprawled in the family room watching old movies.

By New Year’s Eve, whatever bug had laid everyone low died off, and one by one, the family and the Far Flungers embraced their real but weakened selves. The Next Door Neighbors (both sides) arrived with bowls and platters of their party specialties. The Far Flungers, old friends with The Neighbors, mixed up their infamous punch. The Teens’ best friends took over the walkout cellar with CDs, dancing, and ping-pong. The Twins stayed up until 9:30. Everyone else, including The Teens, watched the ball drop. The Neighbors and The Teens hung around another hour before wending their way home, The Neighbors quietly, The Teens with much blaring of horns. The Far Flungers hugged Joanie and Matt and headed for the guestroom.

At the kitchen counter, Joanie and Matt sipped coffee. They marveled that the New Year’s Eve gathering even got to happen.

“Joanie,” Matt said, “How did you escape from getting sick?”

Joanie smiled. “I think I discovered a secret weapon. Every so often during the day and if I were up with The Twins during the night, I ate a bite of cheesecake.”

“You what? Cheesecake?!”

“Shhhh. Don’t wake up everybody! All week I ran around here like a chicken with her head cut off. Y’know that expression about using a lemon to make lemonade?

Well, cheesecake was my version of lemonade.”

“Is their any left?”

“Sorry! One bite led to another . . .”

– Scarlet O’Cheesecake

Grace Howaniec: Ring in ‘07 in style with pomegranate cheesecake - Appleton Post Crescent

Something sumptuous is the prerequisite of any dessert served at a New Year’s Eve
party. But it also needs glamour, glitz and a few conversational gems.

So the New York-style cheesecake with pomegranate-raspberry sauce nails the criteria with a little pizzazz to
spare — namely the presence of trendy pomegranate.

It never ceases to amaze me how flexible cheesecake can be in entertaining. My mouth is watering now!

technorati tags:pomegranate, cheesecake, recipe