Lemon Ricotta Cheesecake
Confession: I’ve never made a cheesecake in my entire life. This seemed like a glaring shortcoming in my dessert repertory, and I figured the weekend was as good a time as any to fix this problem. It was Labor Day weekend and our friend Stevie was throwing a party. I had a Martha Stewart-y vision of myself showing up to her door beaming over my first ever beautiful, perfect cheesecake. I was naively unprepared for the deluge of conflicting doctrines regarding the most authentic variety and style of cheesecake. The disparity in different recipes’ cooking temperatures was staggering. I was pretty sure this left a huge margin for error, but it was just cheesecake. If I really messed it up, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. I chose William Sonoma’s zesty lemon ricotta cake to be my first test. At least if this cake was a flop I’d be able to console myself with ricotta. Continue Reading