Wednesday, November 11, 2020

Marscapone Pumpkin Cheesecake with Pumpkin Seed Brittle (gluten-free!)



Thanksgiving is going to be a lot different this year for most of us. If you are planning a dinner that is much smaller in attendance than normal, this pumpkin cheesecake would be a perfect dessert. Not that it's small in size or lower on decadence (to the contrary, it will feed at least a dozen people and is lusciously rich!)... but even if you are hosting a thanksgiving of just 2 people, this dessert will last in your frig for weeks, and be just as tasty as the week you made it. Make it for Thanksgiving, enjoy until Christmas.... now THAT is a Covid silver lining! 


This is not a Cheesecake Factory cake. Those sicky sweet, clangy disasters of dessert are what give cheesecake such a bad rap. This cheesecake is silky smooth and heavenly. Don't forgo the marscapone nor the bain marie for baking it. Both add to its luscious, smooth, divine texture. Marscapone lasts for months unopened in the frig, so I always pick some up when I'm in a store that has it. When I get home I tuck it in the back of my frig for those unrelenting dreary winter days when your spirit needs a pick-me-up. A good cheesecake never fails to please - whether it's a big event like Thanksgiving or just another dreary November Tuesday.









Marscapone Pumpkin Cheesecake

adapted from Bon Appetit


  • 9 ounces gluten-free graham crackers or gingersnaps or a combination
  • 6 tablespoons melted unsalted butter
  • 1 15-ounce can pumpkin purée
  • 4 large eggs, room temperature
  • 3 large egg yolks, room temperature
  • 1¼ cups light brown sugar
  • 1 tsp cinnamon
  • 1 tsp ground ginger 
  • 1/2 tsp ground cloves
  • 1/4 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
  • ½ tsp kosher salt
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 24 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
  • 8 ounces marscapone, room temperature
  • 1 cup pumpkin seeds (pepitas)
  • 3 tablespoons maple syrup
  • 1/2 tsp salt



Preheat the oven to 350. Pulse graham crackers/gingersnaps in food processor until it is all crumbs. Pour in the melted butter and process again until the texture resembles wet sand - about 1 minute more. Put mixture into a 9-inch springform pan and press it down evenly across the bottom of the pan. Bake for about 10 minutes. Set the pan aside to allow the crust to cool completely before filling and baking. Crust can be made the day before.

Start the pumpkin seed brittle while the crust bakes. Mix the pepitas, maple syrup, and salt in a small bowl. Spread out onto a silicone baking mat placed on top of a baking sheet and bake for 15-20 minutes at 350 until the syrup is bubbling and the color is a golden brown. Set aside to let cool completely.

Heat up a full tea kettle of water (for the bain marie used for baking the cheesecake). Wipe out the food processor to use it again to mix the filling. Process the eggs, egg yolks, pumpkin puree, sugar, spices, vanilla and salt until very smooth. Add the cream cheese and marscapone and process until completely smooth and the cream cheese has all been incorporated, about 2 minutes. 

Put a clean kitchen towel in the bottom of large roasting pan. Wrap the outside of the crust pan with aluminum foil and place on top of the towel in the pan. Pour the filling into the pan. Place roasting pan in the oven and then fill the roasting pan with boiling water until the water comes halfway up the springform pan. (The foil is so that if your springform pan is not water-tight that no water comes in contact with the cheesecake.) Bake until the edges are set and the center is still wobbly, about 1 1/2 hours. Remove from the bain marie and let cool at room temperature for 2 hours. Refrigerate for at least 3 hours. Can be made several days in advance. 

Break up the pumpkin seed brittle and use it to decorate. Either line the edges of the cake with large pieces or pile it up artfully atop the cake. (In my photos I did both and the effect was not as elegant as one or the other!) You will have extra brittle, serve it alongside.

Thursday, November 5, 2020

Guy Fawkes Day Gingerbread Cake, Gluten Free

 As the former American colonies of the British Empire are mired today in sluggish presidential election results amidst a backdrop of grotesquely partisan national discord, perhaps we in the USA could take a break by looking more closely at the celebrations of our former colonizers. Today is Guy Fawkes Day in the United Kingdom. What's this holiday you say? Precisely. It involves celebrating the failure of a plot by Catholics to blow up the House of Lords, kill the king and reinstate the Roman Catholic church in 1605. Guy Fawkes was one of the conspirators who was captured, gave away the plot after two days of torture, and then was sentenced to be drawn and quartered. Today this holiday is celebrated with lots of bonfires and fireworks, symbolic of the gunpowder that was to be used in the attack. Straw effigies of Guy Fawkes are burned. On the whole it seems like a rather barbaric holiday.* 

The total weirdness of the origins of this holiday aside, I for one am all for a cozy bonfire and some fireworks on an otherwise dreary, dark November evening. Throw in the prospect of some English cider, Scottish whisky, and homemade gingerbread and I would even burn a straw effigy to join in. Having lived through two London Novembers I can say that every person on that island reaaaaally needs this holiday to get through this month when the sun never shines.  Especially this year. I hope my English friends that you find a way to get your bonfires and camaraderie while in lockdown. And if you can't... well try my gluten-free gingerbread. It's delicious. Hugs from across the Atlantic. 






Guy Fawkes Day Gingerbread

I found this recipe in my all-time most useful and trustworthy cookbook, the 2006 edition of the cannon of American cookery, The Joy of Cooking. It is listed as "Guy Fawkes Day Cake" but the note says it is also called "parkin" and that it is a classic of northern England. It is delicious served warm from the oven with freshly whipped cream. If you do not need a gluten-free cake simply substitute 1 cup all-purpose (plain) flour for the buckwheat, brown rice flour, and psyllium husk. If you are using all-purpose flour make sure you mix only until the dry ingredients are moistened and not any longer so you don't end up with a tough cake due to overworked gluten (a problem that gluten-free cake bakers do not have!)


1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter

2/3 molasses (or black treacle)

2/3 cup old-fashioned rolled oats

60 grams buckwheat flour

60 grams brown rice flour

1 tsp psyllium husk

1 tbsp sugar

1 tsp ginger

1/4 tsp cloves

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp lemon zest (from 1 large lemon)

2/3 cup whole milk (room temperature)


Preheat the oven to 350. Grease an 8-inch square or round cake pan. 

In a small saucepan melt over low heat the molasses and the butter and stir together. Remove from the heat when melted.

In a large bowl whisk together all the remaining ingredients except the milk. Stir in half the melted butter mixture, then half the milk, then the remaining butter mixture and milk. 

Pour batter into prepared cake pan and bake in the middle of the oven for about 25 minutes, until the cake starts to pull away from the sides of the pan and a toothpick inserted in the center comes away clean. Do not overbake! Let the cake cool in the pan set atop a cooling rack.



* However as a citizen of a nation that built its wealth and power upon the backs of millions of enslaved Africans and has neither apologized to nor compensated the descendants of said enslaved, I don't think I can fairly judge another nation's barbarism.