Contact Me February 2010Laura from the US wrote: I have been baking cheesecakes for a while and have recently begun selling them to raise money for a charity. To do this I have been using my normal spring form pan but replacing the bottom with a foil wrapped cardboard round. It seemed to work great the first time but then the second time I think theround was too big and i felt something "spring" in the spring form pan when I tried to close it. Ever since then my crust splits about halfway up the cheesecake and a piece of it is missing. Do you think my pan is broke? Would I be better off to buy a real cheesecake pan instead of a spring form one? Can I use a cardboard round in a cheesecake pan? Laura: I think it would be difficult to do that without a spring form pan because you wouldn't be able to remove the rim to push the cheesecake out of the bottom. I'm afraid you would break the cheesecake trying to get it out that way. An option for you might be to put parchment paper or wax paper over the bottom of the spring form pan before putting the crust ingredients in and then sliding the baked cheesecake off using that and putting it onto a cardboard round to transport it. I hope this helps. Good luck! Kari from the US wrote: I absolutely love cheesecakes and I want to start my own cheesecake business someday. Right now I work at a bakery 5 days a week and I've just barely started making cheesecakes in my home (I'm making them for people as a side deal). I've done a lot of reading up on how to mix/prepare a cheesecake and I do have a few questions. Do you EVER beat the mixture on anything above LOW speed? I recently made a cheesecake and I tried beating the cream cheese and sugar on a med. low- medium speed (I ran a handle through the batter to get the air bubbles out) and my cake STILL had a couple of bubbles on top (about a dime size)and the rest of it was smooth andbeautiful. I usually bake them at 340-350 degrees for ten minutes then I reduce the heat to 200 degrees and bake for 2 hours; then I let it cool in the oven with the door closed. I just want to be consistent in achieving that professional smooth top. Any advice on what I should/shouldn't do? I'd really appreciate it! Thanks- Kari Kari: Good luck with your future business. I actually have beaten my cheesecakes on medium speed because usually the batter is fairly thick and hard to beat on low. I've never made cheesecakes professionally, just for family and friends. Because of this, I've not really been too concerned about how the top turns out and if it has too many cracks or other flaw, I just cover up the problems with some type of topping and voila...no one can even tell. The taste is usually not affected so there are usually no complaints. A slow oven and leaving it in is a good idea and water baths are a good suggestion as well. Making sure you use quality ingredients is also important. I wish you all the best with making cheesecakes and I hope you submit some of the pictures to my website for others to see.
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