Cranberry White Chocolate Cheesecake Bites

It's so pretty!!! This is a continued take on last weeks holiday bars - I just love the way cranberry and white chocolate taste (and look!) together! There is white chocolate not only drizzled on top of these cuties, but also incorporated into the cheesecake filling. 

Also, I don't know about you guys, but I love when things are in miniature form. So this is the perfect dessert to serve buffet style, cocktail style, or just any way because you make it as a large sheet of cheesecake and cut it into little squares for sharing!

Although these may be harder to ship and share, they certainly will be welcome at any holiday event. To make things even cuter, I stuck them in some santa mini cupcake liners. Pretty cute right?

Beautiful, delicious, and most importantly of all - holiday baked goods!

Cranberry White Chocolate Cheesecake Bites
Adapted from cravingchronicles

Cranberry Jelly
1 lb whole cranberries
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup apple cider
Juice of 1/2 a lemon

Is it thanksgiving yet? Combine these ingredients in a saucepan over medium high heat until cranberries start to pop and break down. Pour through a mesh sieve to filter out the little cranberry skins and leave you with cranberry jelly! Pour your jelly into a container and put it into the fridge until your cheesecake is ready.

Cheesecake crust: I doubled the original recipe because I love crust. You can always half the recipe back to less crust.

8 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup dark chocolate chips
2 tablespoon cocoa powder
2 cups chocolate graham cracker crumbs

Prepare your cheesecake pan! Double line a 9x13 baking pan (or 8X8 if you want more cheesecake:crust ratio) with 2 layers of foil, taking care to leave extra foil hanging from the edges so that you can simply lift the entire cheesecake out later.

Over low heat, melt together the chocolate chips, unsalted butter, and cocoa powder. Once combined, remove from heat and stir in graham cracker crumbs and flatten this mixture onto the bottom of your prepared pan. Stick it into the freezer while you prep your cream cheese filling.

Cheesecake
16 ounces cream cheese softened to room temperature
2 large eggs
1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup white chocolate chips, melted (melt in 30 second intervals in the microwave)

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.

Whip up your cream cheese until it's nice and fluffy without lumps. Incorporate your eggs, sugar, and vanilla. Slowly add in your melted white chocolate chips.

Once it looks delicious, plop your cheesecake filling on top of the chocolate graham cracker crust and bake for 40-45 minutes and let cool in the fridge for at least 4 hours to overnight.

Putting it all together

Once your gorgeous cheesecake on top of chocolately crust has cooled, take about half of your cranberry jelly and melt in the microwave for 30 seconds. Stir your jelly until clump free and if you're feeling super meticulous, you can re-seive it. Spread this on top of your cream cheese filling and if you want, you can melt just a little more white chocolate and use the ziploc bag technique to swirl some white chocolate on top of the red jelly.

These guys are best stored in the fridge if they make it to the leftover stage (otherwise, prompt eating will do as well)

Enjoy!

Sam