Mini Orange-Biscoff Cheesecakes

The Setting: A lovely, sunny day.

The Soundtrack: The occasional tweet of a bird outside my window.

Steaming up the Oven: Nada...but my tummy is a' rumbling.

The Scenario: Biscoff Mania begins!

If you read this post (Sky-High Milk Chocolate Bark), then you know I have a sizable stockpile of Lotus Biscoff wafers at my disposal, and you may have been expecting the proliferation of Biscoff-inspired recipes to begin as promised for quite a while now.

Well...it may be a gradual trickle of caramelized-cookie goodness rather than an explosion...because many non-Biscoff recipes have fought their way onto my agenda...and I'm super-behind on posting...but today I eagerly bring you installment one of Biscoff Mania: Mini Orange-Biscoff Cheesecakes.

I hope you will enjoy them as much as I did!

Mini Orange-Biscoff Cheesecakes
Biscoff cookies are crisp, Belgian wafers that taste like lightly spiced, caramelized sugar. If you can't find or don't want to buy Biscoff cookies, graham crackers or gingersnaps would make excellent substitutes. If the centers of the cheesecakes sink down a little, no worries--they'll still be scrumptious! To take these cheesecakes up another notch, add the seeds of a split and scraped vanilla bean to the cream-cheese mixture along with the sugar.

8 oz Neufchatel cheese (or reduced-fat cream cheese), room temperature
8 oz full-fat cream cheese, room temperature
1 egg
1 T pure vanilla extract
pinch fine-textured salt
20 Biscoff cookies*
2 T melted butter
1/2 cup, plus 2 T granulated sugar, divided
1/4 cup orange marmalade
1 tsp water

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 12-cup, standard-size muffin tin with cupcake liners and place the tin on a baking sheet.

Using an electric mixer, beat the cheeses together with 1/2 cup granulated sugar on medium speed until smooth. Add the egg, vanilla, and salt and beat till well-combined, about 1 minute.

Place the cookies in a food processor and process into sandy-textured crumbs.

If you do not have a food processor, place the cookies in a gallon-sized zip-top bag and crush them with a rolling pin.

Add the melted butter and 2 T granulated sugar to the cookie crumbs and pulse several times to combine. The mixture should resemble slightly damp sand.

If not using a processor, simply mix the sugar and butter into the crumbs with a fork until thoroughly combined.

Divide the mixture evenly among the 12 muffin cups.

Use clean fingers, a spoon, or a small glass to press the crumbs firmly into the bottom and slightly up the sides of each cup.

Place the marmalade and water in a small, microwave-safe cup or bowl and microwave for 15 seconds. Stir until smooth. Spoon 1 tsp of the marmalade mixture evenly into the bottom of each crust.

Divide the cream-cheese mixture evenly among the prepared cups.

Bake at 350 for 25 minutes. Rotate the pan in the oven, turn the oven off, and leave the pan in the closed oven for 30 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and carefully transfer the cheesecakes to a cooling rack to cool completely.

Once completely cool, chill cheesecakes in an airtight container in the fridge for at least one hour before serving. If stacking the cheesecakes in a container, place a piece of parchment or wax paper between each layer and stagger the cheesecakes so that the bottoms of the cheesecakes on the top layer rest on the top edges of the cheesecakes on the bottom layer. The cheesecakes will keep stored this way for up to one week.

*Note: As far as I can tell, Biscoff cookies come in sizes regular, large, and extra-large. This recipe calls for 20 regular-sized cookies, as seen here.

Thanks for reading! Here's to Being the Secret Ingredient in your life.