Amber's Lemon Curd Cheesecake

Here's Amber Lavin's Lemon Curd Cheesecake Recipe, for those of you who like cheesecake. Our Thanksgiving guests RAVED about it!

Lemon Curd Cheesecake

Crust
Cooking spray
¼ cup ( ½ stick) butter, melted
1 ¾ cups vanilla wafers, crushed

Filling
3 8oz packages cream cheese, softened
1 cup sugar
1 cup sour cream
2 tsp grated lemon zest
2 Tbsp lemon juice
3 large eggs

Lemon Curd
1 ½ tsp grated lemon zest
6 Tbsp lemon juice
1 large egg + 1 large yolk
½ cup sugar
2 Tbsp butter, cold and cut into bits

Crust: Preheat oven to 350 and spray 9" spring form pan with cooking spray. In bowl mix crumbs and butter and toss with fork until evenly moistened. Press crumb mixture onto bottom and ½ inch up sides of pan. Bake 8-10 minutes or until the edges are lightly golden and crust is set. Let cool on rack; after cool wrap outside of pan with heavy-duty foil several times. Reduce oven temp. to 325.

Filling: In a large bowl, with electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat cream cheese 2-3 minutes or until fluffy. Gradually beat in the sugar, scraping sides of bowl with spatula, until smooth. With mixer on medium speed add sour cream, lemon zest and lemon juice. Beat in eggs, 1 at a time, just until incorporated. Poor into crust and filled spring form in the middle of a large roasting pan. Carefully pour enough boiling water into roasting pan to reach halfway up sides of spring form pan. Bake for 70-75 minutes until center of cheesecake is almost set, but still slightly jiggle (do not over bake ... cake will firm as it cools). Let cool in water 15 minutes then transfer spring form pan to rack and let it cool completely. Remove foil and refrigerate until chilled, at least 8 hours or overnight. Run thin knife around edge of pan and remove pan sides.

Lemon Curd: In top of a double boiler combine all ingredients except butter. Over gently simmering water, whisk ingredients until hot and frothy, about 5 minutes. Gradually whisk in butter over a time period of 7 minutes or until mixture thickens and coats the back of a spoon. Remove from heat; let cool at least ½ hour. Spread curd over top of the cheesecake and garnish with raspberries (or raspberry jam J)

*I've found that it only takes about 2 decent sized lemons to make the filling and lemon curd and I actually don't use any rind for the lemon zest, but just use the juice and pulp b/c I think it tastes better! Even though the directions are a little long, it actually is pretty easy to make, plus it is always nice to be able to make things the day before and still have them taste great.