falutin

I made these incredibly easy and exceedingly cute desserts on my Food Network show on Saturday. They’re little cherry cheesecake shooters—mini desserts that use a quick cream cheese filling and (wait for it) canned pie filling.

They seriously take 15 minutes to make.

Maybe 16.

 
 
 
Now, I made the same dessert for my new cookbook coming out this fall—only instead of pie filling, I used a cooked cherry and whiskey topping.

Both options are delicious, and I have the two printable recipes below.

Here’s how I make the second version. The first version is identical—just use pie filling instead!

(Note: The recipe below makes a bunch of shooters—you can easily halve it.)

 
To make the topping, I combined frozen cherries and honey in a saucepan…

 
 
 
Stir it around and cook it over medium heat for a few minutes, until it’s hot and bubbly.

 
 
 
This is totally optional: Grab the whiskey from your bedside table and splash in a little! If you’re using an open flame, be careful (you can temporarily turn it off while you pour it in.)

You can totally leave out the whiskey if you’re not feeling it.

*Hiccup!*

 
 
 
Let it cook for another couple of minutes…

 
 
 
Add some butter to the pan and let it melt…

(Note: I adjusted the recipe to call for half this amount of butter. I got a little overzealous!)

 
 
 
Then whisk together some cornstarch and lemon juice…

 
 
 
And pour it in.

 
 
 
Cook it for another couple of minutes, until it thickens up…

 
 
 
Then add a little bit of almond extract.

 
 
 
Next, pour it into a bowl, let it cool to room temp, cover it and refrigerate it for a few hours, until it’s nice and thick and luscious.

 
 
 
Now, when you want to assemble the little babies, make the creamy cheesecake filling! For these, I used two packages of cream cheese…

 
 
 
And a can of sweetened condensed milk. For the show, I used one and one, which makes the filling more of a pudding-like texture.

 
 
 
This is a thicker texture.

Either is delicious!

 
 
 
Next, crush up some graham crackers in a Ziploc: Just pound away until they’re all broken up!

 
 
 
To assemble them, spoon some crumbs into the bottom of a glass. I used mini wine glasses (you can get them at lots of department stores or kitchen supply stores; cute!) but you can also use demitasse cups, small mason jars…any small glass will do.

Here’s a link to the ones I have. They’re $20 for 12 glasses, and you can use them for so many cool things.

Cute Little Wine Glasses

Amen.

 
 
 
Put the filling into a pastry bag or Ziploc, then snip off the end and squeeze in some of the filling. (This is much, much easier than trying to spoon it!)

 
 
 
Next comes the cherry topping (or pie filling)…

 
 
 
And a sprinkling of sliced almonds.

 
 
 
Darling!

 
 
 
And…wow.

These are super fun, super adorable, super easy…and (most important) super good.

Great for parties or fun get-togethers!