Strawberry Cheesecake Parfaits

We all love cheesecake, right?  But it does take time and effort.  You have to make the crust and bake it, then make the filling and, if you do it right, bake the cheesecake in a water bath.  Well, I'm going to show you how to make cheesecake without any baking at all.  It's a deconstructed cheesecake and you layer it in parfait glasses. The cheesecake filling doesn't have any eggs - that's why you don't have to bake it.  These are so easy and you can even make them up ahead of time and refrigerate them.

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Technique 101: Learn Easy Pâte à Choux Dough and Make Beautiful Cream Puffs

Once you know how to make this easy Pâte à Choux dough, you can use it to make a number of different things. Pâte à Choux is cream puff pastry and is used to make cream puffs, gougeres, and even beignets.  I love it because it is simple, fast and I can make it ahead of time.  You can make these beautiful cream puffs and fill them as a dessert with ice cream or whipped cream.  You can make them and fill them for lunch with crab or chicken salad.  You can add cheese to the dough and make savory little gougeres for appetizers, which I will make for a future post.  You can make the cream puffs ahead of time and then simply fill them right before serving - I love recipes that can be made ahead of time, and this one is one of the best and most versatile.  Once you have this basic technique in your cooking arsenal, you will be ready to make all kinds of goodies.

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Pine Nut Cake - Pinolata

I love this cake because you can have it after dinner as a dessert or you can have it in the morning with coffee and it's great either way.  The traditional way to make this cake is very simple which is just mixing up the batter and pouring it into your pan.  But thanks to Andrew Carmellini of Locanda Verde in New York City, I use a different method.  He's a master at taking classic dishes and giving them a new twist and that is what he did with this cake.  In his terrific book, Urban Italian, he makes the usual batter but then he whips up a meringue and folds that into the batter. It makes for a wonderfully light cake.  He also adds lemon zest and juice to the cake, making it even more special.   He likes to slice this cake and makes an ice cream sandwich out of it, with chocolate ice cream!  Now there's an idea.  

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