Craig Claiborne’s Classic Cheesecake

Actually, my all time favorite cheese cake, from Craig Clayborne and Pierre Franey, is the one with toasted filberts. It's a bit of a pain to make but I've always gotten rave reviews.

Craig Claiborne has created some wonderful dishes, but not this one. With a few minor tweaks, it is the recipe for Lindy's cheesecake, published in McCall's 1963 cookbook and in its magazine's Cooking School section where it was referred to as "The Ultimate Cheesecake." The addition of recipes for the traditional strawberry and pineapple toppings will enhance the experience for anyone who wants to duplicate this dense, rich, justly famous, great gastronomic delight. But please, don't call it Craig's.

This is a classic indeed, but another recipe, Three Cities of Spain Cheesecake is easier, creamier and better, using a classic graham cracker crust, and not overloading it with cream cheese and eggs. To say that this cheesecake provides 8 servings is highly questionable, since it includes 5 packages of cream cheese!

Why is the cheesecake pictured at the beginning of the video, and the slice shown for the article one with a graham cracker crust, and not Craig's pie dough crust?

The challenge with a cheesecake is not finding a good recipe, though this one is indeed a classic, but in its presentation. The cake in the video was horribly cracked. Looks are everything with a cake like this. It's pretty hard for one not to taste pretty darned good.

Cooking the cake in a bain-marie is probably the most reliable 'cure' for cracking. Put foil around the pan and don't fill the b-m over the level of the foil to prevent leaking. It also needs to be beaten very gently or for the absolute minimum amount of time necessary to blend the ingredients.

WRONG!!! This is the one:
HAZELNUT CHEESECAKE
Craig Claiborne with Pierre Franey, New York Times, Sunday, September 1, 1974

1-½ cups (about 1 lb.) toasted hazelnuts or almonds, at room temperature
Butter
1/3-cup graham cracker crumbs
2 pounds cream cheese at room temperature
½ cup heavy cream
4 eggs
1 ¾ cup sugar
1-teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees
2. Grind nuts to desired texture
3. Butter the inside of a metal cake pan measuring 8 inches wide and 3 inches deep, do not use a spring form pan
4. Coat the pan with the graham cracker crumbs
5. Place cream cheese, heavy cream, eggs, sugar, and vanilla extract in an electric mixer. Start with a slow speed and increase speed to high until all ingredients are thoroughly blended and smooth
6. Add the nuts and continue to blend until smooth
7. Pour batter into pan and smooth to level the mixture
8. Place the pan in a larger pan so neither touches the sides of the other.
9. Pour boiling water into the outer pan to a depth of ½ inch
10. Place pans in the oven for 2 hours
11. Turn off the oven after 2 hours and let the cake sit in the oven for an additional 1-hour
12. Lift the cake pan out of the water bath and place on a rack.
13. Let it sit at room temperature for at least 2 hours
14. Place a large enough plate over the top of the cake pan and invert them to unmold the cake
15. Serve at room temperature

I have made this cheesecake for almost 50 years and never tire of it.This is the cake that has always been requested by my family for birthdays and other holidays.
Warning - portions should be small. It is ultra rich.

In the mid 1960s on a trip to New York from Holland we had the delicious cheese cake at Lindy's. They gave my wife a copy of the recipe. She found that in order to reproduce the right flavor it required use of Kraft Philadelphia Cream Cheese. Fortunately this cheese could be found in Germany and Belgium.

Now I know where it came from; Craig Claiborne!
I've been making THIS cheesecake for ~35 years, exactly as provided to me as a tired Xerox copy and in the days when such copies were horrible. Following a line-by-line comparison, I find only trivial variations in a potently flavored component or two. The method is exactly the same. I have served it plain and with a variety of fruit compotes, *always* reducing the compote's sugar by at least half and increasing any citrus ingredient. (A few drops of lemon or lime oil are always a bonus, but OIL ONLY, never an extract other than vanilla. It does make a difference.
While not life-changing because I already had the formula and method, it is nice to know where this came from. Thank you Mr. Sifton! NYC or not, Claiborne's 'Deluxe
Cheesecake truly is a Times Classic. Perhaps the best part? Anyone with an an oven and a spring-form pan can make this; it is not complicated.
-CG

Amy cheese cake that doesn't include ricotta cheese is not worthy of the name.

My neighbor introduced me to this cheesecake in the mid '60s. She got the recipe from McCall's cookbook. I think Mr. Claiborne was sharing his knowledge of the New York style cheesecake with his readers rather than implying that it was his creation. Yes...McCall's said it was the recipe for Lindy's New York Style Cheesecake. Don't worry the cracked top. If you take it out of the oven a little before its done, it won't crack. Or it does anyway. I have been in the restaurant business for 35 years and this has always been on the menu. Think I'll have a piece tonight for dinner. :)

I beg to disagree with this recipe, however tasty it sounds! My recipe, straight from the Rockaways, has no doughy crust, and has merely 32 oz. of cream cheese. Instead, it has sour cream and - the crowning indgredient - RICOTTA! Which adds to the fluffy cake-texture along with the flour. More moist than Juniors, and more perfect with the strawberries on top of it :-) Enjoy!

"Accessorized" ??? Please. This is food.
"Topped."
"Garnished."
"Complemented."
"Served."
"Decorated"
"Drizzled."
But I suppose "accessorize" is a word.

Another NYTimes cheesecake recipe, my all-time favorite, came from the Promenade Cafe in Rockefeller Center. It has many of the same ingredients as the Deluxe, of course, but is kinder to folks with celiac: there is no flour in the batter and the side and bottom crusts can be a gluten-free substitute for the graham cracker crumbs in the original recipe. It calls for a water bath and I have very successfully baked it in a soufflé dish.

I have made this cheesecake recipe since it was given to me as a teenager over 30 years ago -- but never knew where it came from. It is truly the best. I am delighted to know the source now, especially as an avid NYT reader.

Any cheesecake recipe that uses flour is anathema. I remember when this one first came out and it has never cut it.

Excuse me, Craig, but this sounds like the Lindy's Restaurant recipe I ripped out of a magazine in college in the early 70's. Almost. Countless oohs and aahs have confirmed to me that this is the creme de la creme (pardon the pun) of cheesecakes. Although yours sounds mouth/tongue watering, mine (Lindy's) boasts a few additional tweaks that elevate it to Numero Uno status.How about a bake-off for old time's (60's/70's) sake?

BTW, the guy that revealed this recipe said he was fired. Not sure which came first but it makes for a good story, n'est pas?

Eddie C.

I am wholly with reader Anne's (California 2 hours ago) opinion. Of all the Times Classics shown on the Web page, I would go only for the Classic Cheesecake and Billi Bi mussel soup, making the latter somewhat less of a soup and more of mussels.

I'm gonna die and go to Heaven. Yum.

A nice set of Classic Recipes but an awful lot of chicken in the collection. A reflection of American tastes? Where are the vegetables? Have they not yet stood the tests of time and yumminess. (What is comfort food if not the intersection of time and yum?)

Great, simple recipe--thanks!