david lebovitz's cheesecake brownies

In amongst moving out, getting married, changing jobs and getting our apartment decked out (for a month, we sat on the carpet with our backs leaning against the wall whilst we waited for our couch to arrive), I barely had time to give this blog much thought. Thankfully all the craziness has finally settled down and now I can comfortably sit on our sofa and have a little bit of me time.

I made these cheesecake brownies a few weeks ago when I was invited over for dinner at A's place. The recipe comes out of David Lebovitz's 'Ready for Dessert' which is my go to book for fail safe recipes when you are bringing a dish. I've tried other recipes for cheesecake brownies but always found that the cream cheese would sink to the bottom but that's one thing you don't have to worry about this one.

Preheat oven to 180 degrees. Line a rectangular tin. In a medium saucepan, melt 85g unsalted butter, add in 115g chopped dark chocolate and stir over low heat until the chocolate is melted and smooth. Remove from the heat and stir in 130g caster sugar followed by 2 large eggs. Mix in 70g plain flour, 8g cocoa powder, a pinch of salt, 1 tsp vanilla extract and then 80g dark chocolate. Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and spread evenly. To make the cheesecake topping, in a medium bowl, beat together 225g cream cheese, 1 large egg yolk, 75g caster sugar and 1/8 tsp vanilla extract until smooth. Distribute the cream cheese mixture in 8 dollops across the top of the brownie batter and then, with a butter knife, swirl the cream cheese mixture very slightly into the batter. Bake for approx. 35 minutes.

Let the brownies to cool completely in the pan before lifting out.

All packed and ready to take to dinner.

These went down quite the treat! By far, the best cheesecake brownie recipe I've come across and makes me even more in love with David Lebovitz (yes, I'm slowly getting closer to owning all his recipe books!)