I was looking to bake something new and yet something that would be ready in couple of hours. This turned out amazing twist to the lemon bars I had made last month. Since with lemon bars I felt the presence of egg was too strong for my liking, I was interested in something that would use less egg and that's when I decided to create these using fusion of cheese cake and bar. I cant believe that this was my so far the most bold *experiment*given that I was to serve the friends who were coming over for dinner right away without any margin to recover but thankfully this turned out really great.
Ingredients
1 Cup Butter
2.25 Cup Sugar
1.5 Egg
1.5 cup Maida
2.5 Spoon Vanilla Essence
2.75 Cup Pecans
12Oz Cream Cheese
2 Pears
1/2 Spoon Cinnamon Powder
Method
- Preheat oven to 350F/175C.
- Using handheld mixer cream the butter till very fluffy and light.
- Add in 2/3 cup of sugar and cream further.
- Add in 1 spoon of vanilla essence, sieved Maida and cream further.
- Mix in the coarsely chopped nuts.
- Grease two baking pans of 6inch in size and spread half of mixture evenly in each pan.
- Bake in oven at 350F/175C for 22 minutes.
- Let the base layer cool down in the pan itself for about 30 minutes
- After 30 minutes, with the handheld electric mixer cream the cream cheese till soft and even.
- Add in 1.5 cup sugar, egg and remaining 1.5 spoon of vanilla essence in the cream cheese and cream till soft and even.
- Cut the pears such that their center is removed and then slice them. Add in 1 Spoon of sugar and mix well. Keep aside.
- Preheat oven to 375F/190C.
- Spread the cream cheese mixture evenly in both the baking pans half in each.
- Spread the pear slices on top of this mixture.
- Sprinkle cinnamon and remaining (around 1 spoon of) sugar evenly on top of pears.
- Bake in the oven over 370F/190C for about 35 minutes.
- Take out of the oven. Let it cool for 30 minutes and then transfer it to fridge for at least another hour and then serve by making square pieces.
Notes
I know 1.5 egg is hard to measure :) but I tried using the mixture with 1 egg and 1 cheese packet but it wasn't enough to cover both pans. For the next egg, I beat the egg and took half the quantity. But in case you are baking this in single pan you could use 8-9 inch pan and use 1 egg with 1 packet of cream cheese. Note you would need to use 1 cup of sugar in that case.
I used pecan nuts because I had them available at home, but you can theoretically use any nuts, they give nice crunch and crisp taste.
I used little overripe pears so they turned out nice tender and I didn't have trouble while making pieces of the dessert.
When you take out the final bar out of the oven, there might be liquid on top, don't worry about it, it sets after the bars cool down.
