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(also posted in my journal, but this is too good not to share with everyone!)

You have plenty of time to make this for your sweetie and you for Valentine's Day...and feed another 23 people besides. It makes a huge cheesecake and is very rich, so serve it in small slices.

Crust:

1 1/2 c. graham cracker crumbs
1/2 c. butter, melted
3 tbsp sugar

Mix these all together and press into the bottom only of a 10" springform pan.

Cheesecake:

1 1/2 lb. cream cheese
3 eggs
1 1/2 c. sugar
1/2 lb. unsweetened chocolate
1/2 c. heavy cream
1/4 c. + 2 oz dark rum, such as Myers
3/4 tsp. vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350F.

Beat the cream cheese with an electric mixer until soft and fluffy. You can do this by hand, but your arm will fall off. Add the eggs and the sugar and continue beating the mixture until all ingredients are incorporated and smooth.

Melt the chocolate in the top of a double boiler. If you don't have a double boiler, use a non-plastic bowl (glass or metal) (plastic tends to melt) over some barely simmering water in a saucepot. Add the cream and the 1/4 c. rum to the melted chocolate and stir well until thoroughly combined. Add the vanilla extract.

Drink the remaining 2 oz. of rum as a quality check.

Combine the cheese and chocolate mixtures until combined and smooth. Pour into the springform pan on top of the graham cracker crust.

Bake 1 hour. Let cool complete in pan before removing the sides and slicing.

The only even slightly tricky part to this is melting the chocolate and mixing in the other stuff. And if you go slow, it's not tricky at all. The rest is just a whole lot of mixing and stirring.

Cheesecake is one of those things which is really easy but impresses the heck out of people.

Yes, you sure could. It's used mainly as flavoring. I'd add an extra bit of heavy cream to make up the liquid volume, but it's really so little you could probably just leave it out and run with it as is.

And by the way, those who are using the rum, don't be tempted to use more rum. In this case more is NOT better. I tried using closer to a cup....and the flavor was just too much. It wasn't good at all. Drink all that extra rum in a drink instead of in the cheesecake.

Aw man, *sigh*
I used to be able to stand cheese...
Now I can barely eat it lest I bloat.

Most of the alcohol does bake out over the baking time - the problem comes when you add too much, there's just not enough time for it all to bake out.

You could use rum flavoring, but not in the same amount - rum extract is FAR more concentrated, and 1/4 cup would overpower everything else. I'd start with a tsp and taste until it balanced well. It's a good place to start, anyway.

And yes, AT, that's from experience. Not that it wasn't eaten anyway - it is cheesecake, after all.