I found a recipe for Lemon Cheesecake bars on the Chicago Tribune site tonight.  I love lemon and I love cheesecake – although sadly if I eat too much cheesecake I end up with a migraine.  I may have to make these one day though.  They’re almost too good to pass up!  I’m going to reprint the recipe here, because we all know that newspaper articles soon disappear…

Lemon ripple cheesecake bars

Prep: 20 minutes Cook: 1 hour Makes: 16 bars
From a recipe by cookbook author Elinor Klivans

Crust:
1 cup flour
¼ cup sugar
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 stick (½ cup) unsalted butter, cut into ½-inch pieces, chilled
Filling:
1 tablespoon plus 2 teaspoons cornstarch
½ cup cold water
2 large egg yolks
1 ¾ cups sugar
¼ cup fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
1 ¼ pounds cream cheese, at room temperature
2 tablespoons flour
3 large eggs, at room temperature
¼ cup sour cream, at room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla
Fresh berries, optional

For crust, heat oven to 325 degrees. Butter a 9-inch square nonstick baking pan. Pulse the flour, sugar, lemon zest and salt in a food processor. Add butter; pulse until a soft, crumbly dough forms. Press dough evenly over the bottom and 1/2 inch up the sides of the pan. Bake until golden, about 20 minutes.

For filling, dissolve the cornstarch in the cold water in a small bowl. Whisk the yolks with 3/4 cup of the sugar and the lemon juice in a medium saucepan. Whisk in the cornstarch mixture; cook over medium heat, whisking, until sugar dissolves and mixture is hot, about 4 minutes. Raise heat to medium-high; heat to a boil, whisking constantly. Cook until mixture is thick and glossy, 1 minute. Strain into a heatproof bowl. Stir in lemon zest. Let cool.

Beat cream cheese with remaining 1 cup sugar in a large bowl with electric mixer until smooth. Beat in the flour until blended. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well between additions. Add sour cream and vanilla; beat until batter is smooth. Pour cream cheese batter over the crust; smooth with a spatula. Place lemon mixture in dollops on the cheesecake batter; carefully swirl it into the batter using the tip of a knife or a skewer.

Bake until golden around edges and just set, 40-45 minutes. Run a knife around edges to loosen the cheesecake. Cool on a wire rack 1 hour; refrigerate until thoroughly chilled. Cut into bars; garnish with berries.

I’ll leave it to you to go to the site and find out all the low down details of how bad it is for your health. I think we all know this will never be health food. But it looks really good.

Happy Eating.