Yesterday I made this Chocolate Vanilla Swirl Cheesecake to take to our Thanksgiving celebration. It was fun to surprise everyone with a homemade cheesecake! :)

I raided Joshua's "cheesecake making supplies" and used Ghiradelli chocolate baking chips for a rich chocolate flavor. Yes, Joshua actually does have his own tote in our pantry where he keeps all his special ingredients for cheesecakes and other food experiments! :)

I'm not sure what all is in his tote, but it includes various chocolates, extracts, food coloring, non-dairy creamer powder, beeswax, and even chocolate graham crackers -- some of which I also used, for the cheesecake crust! It can be really useful having a husband who buys stuff I wouldn't normally keep on hand! :D

This cheesecake is very simple to make, but I over-baked it. Over-baked cheesecake is my most common mistake! :P I need to make them more often to keep "in the groove"!

I skipped the water bath, since I don't have a pan that would work for it right now. I knew the cheesecake would cook faster without the water bath, so I checked it at 60 minutes (instead of 70 minutes) and it was already too set! Still yummy, but not perfect. :)

I also "cheated" and used the electric mixer on low for about 30 seconds on the cream cheese. The very best cheesecakes are stirred gently by hand the whole time, but my arms were tired after kneading my huge bowl of pumpkin dinner rolls that morning!! :)

I thought I could get away with the mixer on low, but not on this one.

Electric mixer + no water bath + over-cooked = huge crack on top!! (But not as huge as the cracks on this cheesecake of Joshua's!)

Next time I'll bake a perfect cheesecake. I hope! :D