Blueberry Lemon Cheesecake Bars

These are a beautiful, quick and easy, refreshing desert bars! They come out pretty full of lemon after the zest and juice of 2 lemons. So feel free to cut that in half, or if you are a lemon fan leave it as is. Also I used frozen blueberries, because they were out of fresh at the market, either way it turns out great! You can even mix it up and use raspberries in place of the blueberries. Have fun with this one, its a real show stopper!

From Tyler Florence

For the base:

• Butter, for greasing
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 9 graham crackers
• 1/2 stick unsalted butter, melted

For the filling:

• 16 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
• 2 eggs
• 2 lemons, zested and juiced
• About 1/2 cup sugar, eyeball it
• 1 1/2 cups fresh blueberries
• Powdered sugar, for dusting

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.


Grease the bottom of a 9 by 9-inch baking pan with butter. Then place parchment paper over the top, pressing down at the corners. In a food processor, process the sugar, cinnamon and graham crackers until you have the texture ofbread crumbs. Add the melted butter and pulse a couple of times to fully incorporate. Pour into the lined baking pan and gently pat down with the base of a glass. Bake in the oven for 12 minutes until golden. When done set aside to cool.

Add cream cheese, eggs, lemon zest, lemon juice and sugar to the food processor and mix until well combined. It should have a smooth consistency. Pour onto the cooled base and then cover with blueberries. They will sink slightly but should still be half exposed -- as the cake bakes they will sink a little more and break down.

Bake in the oven for 35 minutes or until the center only slightly jiggles. Remove from the oven and cool completely before refrigerating for at least 3 hours. Once set, remove from pan using the parchment lining and slice into 10 rectangular bars. Dust with powdered sugar.