Baked Eggnog Cheesecake—Prototype 14:
 
How about pre-baking the crust in order to reduce its sogginess? Furthermore, because I increased the batter's cottage cheese back in Prototype 12, I was moved at that point to boost its rum extract as well. However, it wasn't long before I suspected that this extract was a little too much. Therefore, I decided to cut it back to its earlier amount (while keeping the cottage cheese at 2 1/2 cups). As with Prototype 13 (and most of my other baked eggnog cheesecake prototypes up to this point), I used Hood eggnog.
 
Repeat Prototype 13, but reduce the batter's rum extract by 1/2 teaspoon, back to only 1 teaspoon.

Also, after the crust has been placed into the pan, pre-bake it (no tub during this phase) for about 20 minutes at 300 degrees, then cool it off until it can be comfortably touched. Add the batter afterward and bake (in a tub at this point) for about 110 minutes.
 
The pre-baking paid off! The crust's texture, I felt, was decent (nice taste, too). However, I felt that the batter was a little overdone (maybe I had been getting more sensitive to overbaking lately). Indeed, there were about a couple of noticeable cracks, and the outer batter (i.e., at the circumference) seemed a little too dry at the surface. Furthermore, the taste might have been a tiny bit too acidic or tart. My eggnog plans for the future, when I get to it: only 2 teaspoons of lemon juice for the batter, which itself should have its oven time cut to only 100 minutes.

But all the refining that I have done up to this point has paid off in an eggnog cheesecake that did very well at Living Hope Church.
 

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