Snickers Cheesecake (or any other left over candy bar)

 Snickers cheesecake! The thing I love about this recipe is that it doesn't have to be Snickers. Last year after Kalynn had her first trick-or-treating experience, she came home with a bucket full of Butterfingers, Heath Bars, and Whatchamacallits. They all work for this recipe. For Father's Day this year, we went for a BBQ at my family's house and I was in charge of dessert. I just so happened to grab a couple of Snickers because that's what was on sale, but if you have leftover anything-else, by all means, use that.  

Ingredients:

1 3/4 cup finely crushed chocolate graham crackers

1/2 cup butter, melted

3 regular sized (or 6 fun sized) Snickers Bar candy bars (or whatever)

3 8-oz packages cream cheese, softened

1 cup sugar

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 eggs

1 egg yolk

1/4 cup milk

Normally when you make a graham crust, you combine the butter and the crushed graham cracker, press it to the bottom of your pan and bake it. However, with this recipe you skip the baking step because when the caramel and chocolate in the Snickers (or whatever) melts, it solidifies the crust on it's own. So all you need to do press the crumb mixture to the bottom of your pie pan or springform pan or whatever you're using. I happened to use a rocks glass because that's what I had handy, but you can use a spoon or a measuring cup or basically anything with a flat bottom.

Next, chop up 2 of your 3 candy bars and make a layer directly on top of your crust

Cheesecake filling:

in a large mixing bowl beat cream cheese (make sure your cream cheese is softened! I blew out the motor of one of my hand mixers trying to do this step with freshly refrigerated cream cheese) sugar, flour, and vanilla until combined. Add eggs and egg yolk all at once, beating on low speed just til combined. Stir in milk.
Pour filling into crust and candy bar lined pan.

Bake at 375 degrees for 45-50 minutes for the 8-inch pan, 35-40 minutes for the 9-inch pan, or til center appears nearly set when shaken.
Cool  cheesecake completely and chill at least 4 hours.
Chop and sprinkle your remaining candy bar on top of cheesecake. You can also add caramel or chocolate syrup for garnish.

I also stuffed organic raspberries with dark chocolate chips and had full intentions of bringing them as a more healthy alternative snack, but I ate the whole batch before we ever left the house. So... I'm sorry about that.

High Park Fire update:

Our fire is up to 59,500 acres according to the latest report. The National Weather Service has extended our red flag high fire danger warning until 9pm tonight because the fire is so large, that opposing winds could potentially create a whirlwind effect in the fire zone. The good news? The local channels are finally reporting this beast at 50% contained. Hurray! End in site? "We hope so, but we can't predict when that is just yet," says federal incident management.  "Yesterday really serves as a reminder ... this isn't a single battle; this is a campaign," Larimer County Sheriff Justin Smith said. "We are going to have some good days. We are going to have some tough days."

This was my view out the car window heading back to Fort Collins from the Windsor area Sunday night. It doesn't look so bad in pictures, but if you can imagine how big those mountains are on the left side of the picture,(gigantic) you can use that to gage the smoke plumes. Those lights on the right side is our town of Fort Collins.

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