For Thanksgiving this year I made a real spring form cheesecake for the first time. I was pretty nervous but it ended up not being so bad. I found online a few pumpkin cheesecake recipes and settled on coming up with a skinny version that tastes like Cheesecake Factory's pumpkin cheesecake. Yeah, you heard me right. You can thank me later.
Ingredients:
Crust
-1 1/2 cups low fat graham cracker crumbs
-5 tablespoons of butter, melted (I use I Cannot Believe It's Not Butter sticks which are 1/2 ICBINB and 1/2 butter)
-1 tablespoon Splenda
Cheesecake Filling
-Three 8 ounce packages of 1/3 less fat cream cheese, softened
-1/2 cup sugar
-1/2 cup Splenda
-1 teaspoon vanilla
-1 cup fresh or canned pumpkin
-3 egg whites
-1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
-1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
-1/4 teaspoon allspice
Optional Topping
-Whipped Cream
Mix together crust ingredients until coated and crumbly.
Press crust into a spring form pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 5 minutes.
Combine cream cheese, sugar, Splenda, and vanilla in a large bowl. Mix in an electric mixer until smooth. Add pumpkin, egg whites, and spices, and beat until smooth and creamy.
Pour mixture over the crust.
Bake at 350 degrees for 60-70 minutes.
Once cooled, refrigerate and remove from pan. Serve chilled with whipped cream if desired.
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