Celebrating National Bittersweet Chocolate Day

In honor of this happy occasion presenting 

 Black Forest Mini Cheesecakes 

Cook's notes: When a small bite will do-basically three incredible desserts in one, chocolate, cheesecake and pie. Doesn’t get much better than that, right? Enjoy!
Recipe makes 1 dozen and be sure to use quality chocolate for this recipe e,g, Ghirardelli 60% cacao. You will need 12 foil cupcake liners.  I used a jarred variety of cherry fruit filling rather than canned.  

Cookie Ingredients:

• 15-18 Oreo cookies
• 3-4 TB. melted butter

Cheesecake Ingredients: 

• 2/3 cup sugar
• 2 TB. cocoa powder
• 1/8 tsp. salt
• 12 oz. cream cheese (1-1/2 pkg.) softened
• 3/4 cup bittersweet or semi sweet chips, melted and cooled slightly
• 1/4 cup each heavy cream and sour cream
• 2 large eggs
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• Optional 1 TB. Kirsch (cherry brandy) another fruit brandy or apple juice

Topping Ingredients: 

• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 1 TB. powdered sugar
• 1/2 tsp. almond extract 
• 1 jarred cherry pie topping

Cookie Crust and Cheesecake Filling Directions:

• Preheat oven to 325 degrees. 
• Use a food processor to finely grind cookies. Stir in butter to mix. Line a standard size muffin tin with foil liners. Divide cookie crumbs among 12 liners, about a heaping tablespoon.  Pat down crust and bake 4 minutes. Set aside.
• In a small bowl stir together sugar, cocoa powder and salt.   
• In a mixing bowl add softened cream cheese, sugar/cocoa mixture, melted chocolate, heavy cream and sour cream, beat until combined. Add in eggs one at a time, vanilla and Kirsch if using. 
• Tap bowl on counter a few times to release any air bubbles.    
• Divide batter among foil liners (they will be full almost to the top). Tap pan a couple of times to make sure no air bubbles.
• Bake 15 minutes or until the centers jiggle just slightly.
• Cool for an hour and refrigerate for few hours. 

Topping Directions:

• In a chilled bowl with chilled beaters, beat cream, powdered sugar and extract. 
• Add cherry fruit filling and topping just before serving.