Ingredients
Crust
- 1 package chocolate sandwich cookies (I used dark chocolate Oreos®)
- 2 Tbsp butter (melted)
Batter
- 2 8oz packages cream cheese
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 2/3 cup sugar
- 1 Tbsp all purpose flour
- 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
- 3 eggs
- 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips (melted in 1 T cream)
- black food coloring (or substitute with 1-2 T black cocoa powder)
Decorating
- black cookie icing or candy melts
- black sanding sugar
Instructions
Crust
- Preheat oven to 275 degrees. Place cookies in a food processor and process into crumbs and transfer to a small bowl. Add melted sugar and mix until well combined. Line bottom of a springform pan with a round of parchment paper and spray lightly with cooking spray. Press crumbs into the bottom of the pan and smooth out crumbs to create an even crust. Refrigerate while prepping batter.
Batter
- In a large bowl, beat cream cheese and vanilla until combined. Add sugar and beat until fluffy. Add flour and cinnamon and mix. Beat in eggs one at a time, scraping down sides of the bowl after each addition.
- Melt chocolate: In a microwave-safe bowl, add 1 T cream to chocolate chips and heat for 1-2minutes on defrost setting of your microwave. Take care not to overheat. Stir well until smooth and let cool on counter a bit.
- Add melted chocolate into batter and beat until combined. Add black food coloring (or black Cocoa powder) until desired color is reached. (Note: The batter will darken upon baking.) Pour batter into prepared Springform pan. Place pan on a cookie sheet and bake at 275 degrees for bout 1 1/4 hours or until center of cheesecake is firm. Cool for 15 minutes and then run a knife around the edge of the Springform pan to loosen the cake from the sides. Cover and refrigerate for 4 hours. When read to serve, run a knife around the edge again and remove the Springform pan from the cheesecake.
Decorating
- Draw a template on parchment paper (see below) and place another piece of parchment over the template so you can make a few faces with icing or candy melts until you get the look desired.
- The icing is very fragile when dried, so you'll want to make them thick and let them dry completely, usually overnight. I placed a small fan on mine, overnight. If using candy melts, place in fridge to firm up. When completely dry, gently peel parchment back to release the face pieces, but be very careful, they will break if you move peel too quickly.
- After your face pieces are ready, cut the half moon shape out of your template and place the non-face side of your template on the cheesecake. Sprinkle black sugar crystals to the exposed cheesecake to create a dark side of the moon. Carefully remove the parchment template to reveal the black sugar half moon.
- Place your pieces onto your cheesecake to transform this basic cheesecake into a Halloweenready piece of art! Happy Halloween!
