BEST NEWS OF THE YEAR!!

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I am so happy I can hardly contain myself. Oh, the power of prayer!! Oh, the goodness of God!!! Oh, the mercy, the joy, the gratitude!!

Archbishop Timothy Dolan was just elected to be the President of the United States Council of Catholic Bishops!! This is unprecedented (historically, the VP has always been elected president, and Abp. Dolan was not the VP). I cannot express how huge this is; how monumental, and how earth-shatteringly wonderful!

 As one deacon put it: (read the whole article here)

Archbishop Timothy Dolan loves the Lord and the Church with an infectious enthusiasm borne of a sincere, living faith. Anyone who has been around him for any period of time experiences the obvious, he is filled with the joy of the Lord. He is also an evangelizer, to the bone. He has quickly become a significant personality on the Catholic Channel of the Sirius Radio Network. He is a man comfortable in his own skin, at ease with the use of the media, filled with the Holy Spirit, and eager to share the Gospel, as it is found in its fullness within the Catholic Church...

Wherever he serves, he is dearly loved by his priests and deacons... He is also a dynamic and inspiring communicator and solid teacher of the truths as taught by the Magisterium of the Church. Finally, he is a true leader, naturally and supernaturally.

Amen. What a wonderful man to represent the face of Catholicism to our media and country.

He's promised Dunkin' Donuts for USCCB committee morning coffee breaks, and Häagen-Dazs for the afternoons. A man after my own heart.

As such, to honor this dear bishop of New York, I'm going to make a NY cheesecake for dessert tonight. I'd urge you to join me.


(Yes, I know NY cheesecake has no crust on the sides, but I like it with a crust).

New York Cheesecake
Recipe from Gourmet, adapted via Smitten Kitchen


Crumb crust
1 cup finely ground graham crackers or cookies such as chocolate or vanilla wafers
8 tablespoons (1 stick or 4 ounces or 113 grams) unsalted butter, melted
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt

Very tall cheesecake filling:
5 (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
1 3/4 cups sugar
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
1 teaspoon finely grated orange zest
5 large eggs
2 large egg yolks
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Cherry topping (optional)
10 ounces sweet or sour cherries, pitted (frozen is fine)
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1/2 cup water

Make crumb crust: Stir together crust ingredients and press onto bottom and up the sides, stopping one inch shy of the top rim, of a buttered 9 1/2-inch (or 24 cm) springform pan. You can fill it right away but I like to pop my into the freezer so it quickly sets while I prepare the filling.

Make very tall cheesecake filling: Preheat oven to 550 degrees (unless your pan is Teflon-coated, and then do 475 and bake longer). Beat together cream cheese, sugar, flour and zest with an electric mixer until smooth. Add vanilla, then eggs and yolks, one at a time, beating on low speed until each ingredient is incorporated. Scrape bowl down between additions; I cannot stress this enough as if you do not, you’ll end up with unmixed stripes of cream cheese.

Put springform pan with crust in a shallow baking pan (to catch drips). Pour filling into crust (springform pan will be completely full) and baking in baking pan in the middle of the oven for 12 minutes or until puffed. Please watch your cake because some ovens will top-brown very quickly and if yours does too fast, turn the oven down as soon as you catch it. Reduce the temperature to 200 degrees and continue baking until cake is mostly firm (center will still be slightly wobbly when pan is gently shaken), about one hour more.

Run a knife around the top edge of the cake to loosen it and cool the cake completely in springform on a rack, then chill it, loosely covered, at least 6 hours.

Make cherry topping (optional): Place all ingredients together in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil. Once it is boiling, cook it for an additional one to two minutes then remove from heat. Cool completely.
Remove side of pan and transfer cake to a plate. If you had any wonky baking issues, you might need to trim the cake flat.
Spread topping (if using) over chilled cheesecake. The original recipe says to bring this to room temperature before serving, but I never have!

Do ahead: Cheesecake keeps, covered and chilled, 2 weeks.

Image from Smitten Kitchen

What are you making?