Italian Mascarpone and Ricotta Cheesecake

Perfect for Special Occasions

This cheesecake is a wonderful way to show your love. Know someone who's love-language is food? They will appreciate this unique cheesecake!

Honey-Granola Crust

To further level-up this cheesecake, this recipe incorporates a crust made with granola bars! It's homemade yet not difficult to prep. The granola bar based crust adds flavors of honey, oats and almonds.

No-Cracks

I'll also show you how to bake your cheesecake in a water bath to get a perfectly flat top — no cracks, no falling apart. It's easy to achieve when you follow the steps.

Fluffy and Light

This ricotta cheesecake is very light and almost fluffy thanks to the texture of the ricotta itself. It's not as dense and what you'd expect from a traditional cheesecake, which for me is fabulous! So if you sometimes feel put off by the density of a traditional cheesecake, you'll love this lighter version.

★ How to Make this Recipe ★

This is an easy recipe to make if you follow the directions.

Here's a quick look at what's involved:

• Blend granola bars, almonds, salt and butter.
• Press crust into greased springform pan and bake.
• Sprinkle baked crust with sugar and flour.
• Blend cheeses with sugar. Add lemon juice, vanilla and almond extract then eggs.
• Pour mixture on top of baked crust.
• Wrap pan in foil.
• Place in cast iron skillet or roasting pan.
• Fill skillet/roasting pan with hot water.
• Bake. Cool in fridge.
• Add toppings and serve!

It's an easy process if you just follow the steps.

Check out the video beneath the the recipe below to watch, step by step, including the water bath.

★ Tips & FAQs ★

Finally, the crust is a bit more complex than your traditional graham cracker crust. The almonds add an earthy elements and the crunchy oats bring additional texture to this otherwise very creamy dessert.

If you're short on time, it's totally fine to use a pre-made graham cracker crust.

What kind of pan do you need to make a cheesecake?

There is a special pan you'll need to use to make a proper cheesecake — a springform pan. They look like this: For this recipe, you'll want to use a 9" springform pan. A springform pan has a bottom that releases from the sides after the cheesecake is cooked.

This special pan is what gives your cheesecake the perfect, low-profile, flat-topped shape you see at restaurants but to really perfect your cheesecake, you'll need to bake the cheesecake in a water bath.

How to Prevent Cheesecake from Cracking

A water bath is an important technique that prevents the top of your cheesecake from cracking. It seems complicated and fancy but it's really not hard so don't skip this step!

With a water bath you get a perfectly smooth and flat top to your cheesecake, like this:

Just follow the recipe directions below for more explanation and watch the video to learn you how to set up your water bath.

It's pretty easy if you use the right tools. Once you've done it once or twice, it will feel like second nature.

What type of granola bars are used for the crust?

You want to use Nature Valley Oat's 'n Honey crunchy granola bars.

You can find these at most grocery stores in the snack aisle or near the breakfast bars. Most popular stores like Walmart and Target carry these. If you can't find them, a traditional graham cracker crust works well too. Or you can order them on Amazon.

Storing and Freezing

Storing in the Fridge

This cheesecake does need to be refrigerated and not left on the counter. You can store for up to 4 days in the fridge. Store in an airtight container.

Freezing and Thawing

After baking and cooling, you can freeze this cheesecake in an airtight container then thaw all the way through before serving. It can take up to 5 hours to fully defrost from frozen to ready to serve.

Helpful Tools

You'll need a few special tools to make this mascarpone ricotta cheesecake recipe:

• Food processor
• Springform pan - 9" pan for this recipe
• Cast iron skillet - Larger than your springform pan to use for the water bath