Fourth of July Desserts

Desserts should be colorful on the 4th of July and guess what those colors should be? You guessed it, red, white and blue… It is very simple to achieve that goal and the following are two delicious recipes that everyone will love. The first dessert is an ice-cream cookie sandwich. This one is for the kids and the next is a delicious cheese cake with a nutty graham cracker crust and topped with strawberries, raspberries and blueberries.
Chocolate Cookie Ice Cream Sandwich

• 1 pint vanilla ice cream
• 1 pint strawberry ice cream
• 1 pint blueberry ice cream
• 1 box chocolate wafer cookies

The first tip for assembling the ice cream sandwich is to do it quickly. It can be made in stages over a few days, but each time it is out of the freezer, work quickly to avoid melting, and re-cover it tightly with plastic wrap before refreezing. Chocolate wafer cookies are perfect in size and shape for holding the confection together.
Start by softening the pint of strawberry ice cream. Depending on how thick you want the sandwich to be, determines how many tablespoons of ice cream to pile on the cookie: to repeat… work quickly. For a more stable sandwich, top the ice cream with another chocolate wafer. Roll the sides of each layer as you make them in red, white or blue non -perils, stars or jimmies. You can purchase these edible candies at Cake Art in Atlanta. Wrap in plastic and put in the freezer to harden. The next day or when the ice cream has hardened, repeat the process with the vanilla and then blueberry ice creams.

Fourth of July Cheesecake
Cut and place parchment paper in the bottom of a 9 inch spring form pan. Preheat the oven to 300 degrees. Easy to find the parchment  paper at Bed, Bath and Beyond.
 
Prepare the crust:

• 1 ½ C graham cracker crumbs
• 2 T sugar
• ¼ C finely chopped pecans
• 2 T flour
• 4 T melted butter
• Combine all ingredients and press crumbs into the bottom of the springform, edging the crust up the sides of the pan. Use the heel of your hand.

Filling

• 32 ozs. of cream cheese softened
• 1 ½ C sugar
• 4 large eggs
• 1 t. vanilla extract
• 1 C sour cream ( 8 oz. container)
• Beat the softened cream cheese on medium high for 2 minutes. Add sugar and beat for 4 additional minutes, continually scraping down the sides of the bowl. Incorporate eggs one at a time. Next add vanilla and sour cream. Mixture should be smooth with no lumps.
  Pour into spring form ,place in a baking tray with side, in case springform leaks and bake for 60 minutes until the middle ripples slightly. Remove from oven and let cake cool. Refrigerate for a minimum of 8 hours.

Fruit Topping

• 1 container raspberries
• 1 basket strawberries hulled
• 1 container blueberries
• 2 t blueberry or raspberry preserves
• Remove cake from refrigerator and spread 2 t preserves over top of cake. Do not remove spring form ring. Make your own design with blueberries and strawberries. Idea # 1: Place strawberries to make a five point star and fill middle with either blueberries or strawberries. Idea #2: Create a flag using blueberries as stars and rows of halved strawberries as stripes. Idea #3: Get creative!