Wednesday, March 14, 2012 Brie Cheesecake with a Girl Scout Cookie Crust

I took one for the team this year and bought one box each of the new Girl Scout Cookies. The Savannah Smiles are simply stupendous. Crisp and tart with a melt in your mouth powdered sugar finish. The cranberry ones, Thank U Berry Much, were okay. Maybe I should have waited a day after the lemon one before trying one of these. A good cookie but it lacks the pizazz you would expect from a cookie containing a tart cranberry treat. And it could have used more of them. The tiny bits barely made an impact.

But, I wanted to make something using the cookies. All hopes of a savory dish like last year's Samoas Shrimp were quickly dashed. Neither cookie seemed right for what I had in mind - a cranberry crumble topped Shepard's pie and a lemon crusted chicken or fish. Both were way too sweet, what was I thinking? So my mind went to cheesecake.


Brie Cheesecake

1/2 pound of triple creme brie, softened and rind removed

1/2 pound of cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup vanilla sugar (plain sugar is fine, add vanilla extract after the egg)

1 egg

Mix cheeses and sugar with an electric mixer until smooth. Add egg and mix until smooth.




Girl Scout Cookie Crust

8 Thank U Berry Much cookies

4 Savannah Smiles cookies

3 Tablespoons of melted butter


Put cookies in food processor and blend until they're crumbs. Add melted butter and mix. Put nine liners in a cupcake pan and fill each cup with two and a half teaspoons of cookie mixture. Press down into the bottoms of the cups with your fingers.



Using an ice cream scoop fill each cup with cheesecake mixture. I used two scoops per cupcake.

Bake in a hot water bath (I used a roasting pan) at 350 for approximately 25 minutes.



Chill before eating (which I didn't do - I ate it lukewarm and it was DDelicious \m/)

The cookies are actually the star here - the cranberry and lemon flavors dance around your tongue as you consume every creamy, sweet, earthy, smooth, somewhat savory bite of the brie cheesecake. Okay, maybe the cheesecake is the star. It has a real nice finish that doesn't leave an overly sweet "I'm going into a diabetic coma because this dessert was pure sugar" feeling in your mouth.

Try these - that's all I'm going to say. Thanks Girl Scouts! You Rock \m/

-HH