White Chocolate Peppermint Cheesecake

Want to know how to make a cheesecake taste even more rich?  Add white chocolate to your batter!   Inspired by the Starbucks White Chocolate Peppermint Mocha drink, I decided to turn the house favorite Oreo Cheesecake into the perfect holiday treat for our dinner guests this past weekend.

I followed the white chocolate and raspberry swirl cheesecake recipe from Junior's Cheesecake Cookbook but eliminated the raspberry swirl for 8 chopped Trader Joe's Candy Cane Joe-Joes.  Also, the crust was made with the chocolate peppermint cookies.

Chocolate Cookie Crust
A Baked By Jen Original
Makes 1 9-inch crust

15 chocolate peppermint sandwich cookies
3 tablespoons butter, melted

Preheat oven to 350F.  Place the cookies in a ziploc bag.  Flatten, remove excess air, and seal.  Roll a rolling pin over the bag until you have finely crushed crumbs.  Place crumbs in a bowl and mix in the melted butter.  Press firmly into a 9-in springform pan.  Bake for 8-10 minutes.  Remove from the oven and let cool on a wire rack as you proceed with cheesecake recipe.

White Chocolate Peppermint Fudge

I am pretty sure I have gained 10 pounds this month alone; I am afraid to step on the scale at this point.  The last few weeks, I have been baking up all sorts of holiday sweets for family, friends, coworkers, from the tried and true to something new, like this white chocolate peppermint fudge.

I've included the recipe; however, I would increase the amount of extract to at least 1 teaspoon the next time I make it.  The peppermint flavor was very subtle.

White Chocolate Peppermint Fudge

slightly adapted from AllRecipes.com

Makes 64 pieces

2 (10z) packages of white chocolate chips

1 (14oz) can of sweetened condensed milk

1/2 teaspoon of peppermint extract

1 1/2 cups of crushed peppermint candy canes, divided

Line an 8-inch square baking pan with aluminum foil.

Combine the chips and sweetened condensed milk in a saucepan over medium heat.  Stir frequently until almost melted, remove from heat and continue to stir until smooth.  When the chips are completed melted, stir in the extract and the crushed candy canes, reserving 1/4 cup.

Spread mixture evenly in the bottom of the prepared pan.  Sprinkle remaining crushed candy canes over the top.

Chill for 2 hours, then cut into 1 inch squares.

The other sweets that I have made over the last few weeks included:

Pecan Pie Bars

Red Velvet Cupcakes

Sugar Cookies

Chocolate Almond Butter Toffee Bark