Things Bakers Know: The King Arthur Baking Podcast
Cracking the Cheesecake Code, featuring Carla Hall
23 Mar 2026
Chapter 1: What is the history of cheesecake?
The image of a perfectly baked cheesecake sent you back to the waterbed? No wonder you hate cheesecake. Oh my God. From King Arthur Baking Company, this is Things Bakers Know. I'm David Tamarkin, King Arthur's Editorial Director.
And I'm Jessica Badalana, King Arthur's Staff Editor. And we are back today with Season 3. This is our kickoff.
The enhanced season.
The enhanced season. We have added a video component.
Yes. And we are on Substack now. So please follow us there at KingArthurBaking.com. That means you can follow us on Substack. We launched a newsletter to accompany the podcast. Yeah. And the video means you can watch us on YouTube and Spotify. And you can listen everywhere.
Everywhere. I think it's just nice because it's another way for us to engage with our listeners, our viewers. I feel like we've gone pro. You know, we have this nice set.
Yeah.
And for all the people wondering, how would it be? What would it be like if Jessica and David were in the same room?
Yeah. For all the people who are wondering, how old are they? Yeah. You know, now they will know.
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Chapter 2: What are Carla Hall's best tips for making cheesecake?
And I support you. But I'm here to offer a counterpoint for those listeners and viewers now. Welcome. Because I like cheesecake. I like it. I don't love it. I like it. I would say we're in the minority, though, because people... Love cheesecake. I was reporting a story about Wisconsin once, a travel story.
And I was going to all these restaurants, you know, like, are these the hot new restaurants? Talking to pastry chefs. And they all told me, they're like, we love working in Wisconsin. We love, you know, the Wisconsin people. But they will not let us take a cheesecake off the menu. Like, they revolt. They revolt.
That doesn't surprise me.
I mean, in a cheese state, like we are in now, Vermont. But I think it's all 50 states.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah. People love it. You know, for a while, every dessert menu, even without seeing the dessert menu in a certain period of time, you could be like, I know what's on that dessert menu. It's an apple tart. It's a lava cake. It's a cheesecake. There's sort of a lineup.
And then ice cream.
Ice cream.
Yeah.
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Chapter 3: How do water baths affect cheesecake baking?
Oh, I love that. I thought it was amazing.
And I actually think... And here's where I'm just going to, you know, be negative again. Like that type of cheesecake that you're describing is actually my least favorite. So the New York cheesecake that you're describing, this one is unusual because of the sponge cake base, but it's like very dense.
almost fudgy very tall not that sweet actually and it's extremely cheesy and it's not my favorite style but you know cakes made with cheese i think juniors has perhaps claimed in the past to be the inventor of the cheesecake i don't know i mean i think we've in our research we've seen that's not true
Yeah, I mean, because cakes, cheesecakes, or at least cakes made with cheese, like date, I mean, it's like Roman Empire stuff. Like, as long as there's been cheese, people have been making cheesecake. You know, in Italy, they make cheesecake with ricotta. You know, in Germany, they make it with like cottage cheese. So hot right now. Or pork. Right, pork.
Yeah.
That is, I mean, in the trajectory of cheesecake, kind of a modern invention because, you know, cream cheese as we know it, like Philadelphia style stabilized cream cheese was not invented until I think the 1870s?
1872 we have here and which is crazy because, you know, we think of it as a forever thing.
Yeah, what were people... Where were people even putting on their bagels? Exactly. Before 1920. Right. Because bagels are, well, we have another episode all about bagels. But bagels, of course, also were invented before 1920. So, like, what was happening? Buttered bagels? Anyway. I actually do love just a buttered bagel. Me too, but that's for a different episode.
Different episode. But you can see the natural progression from cheesecakes that were made with ricotta, quark, to those that were made with cream cheese. And what happened, some European bakers came to the States, especially to New York. German bakers, a lot of German Jewish bakers were bringing this style of cheesecake over, and then cream cheese was invented, and then... Game on.
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Chapter 4: What is the difference between New York-style and Basque cheesecake?
I mean, that's a great segue into like the modern state of particularly New York style cheesecakes because it's, Pretty rare that you see someone eating one that's just, like, the plain vanilla-specced slice of cheesecake. Now, they all... They have fruit toppings. They're marbled. They have... There's Oreos in them. I mean, they have really gone wild.
Well, because it's sort of a blank canvas, right? I mean, that's what the thing is. Like, you can add almost any flavor to a cheesecake, and it's, like, not going to be offensive. And people do it. I mean, I've seen it. But the other thing that I want to say about...
new york cheesecakes so a lot of cheesecakes are baked in water baths but that's not true of all new york style cheesecakes a lot of them are just put into the pan and then thrown into a hot oven and so they puff pretty dramatic they puff pretty dramatically they get brown on top and then they kind of sink so it has that like brown almost skin like crust to it which is kind of a distinctive feature of a new york cheesecake
And of course, a water bath is meant to prevent exactly that from happening. The water bath, for those viewers who don't know, is when you put a cake or any other baked good in a pan of water and slide it into the oven. Water, of course, can't get above 212 degrees, so it keeps the sides and the bottom of the baked good clean. at that temperature or lower.
So it's regulated, even if your oven's at 400 degrees, the sides and the bottom are kept at a lower temperature.
Well, and it makes sense because cheesecake is essentially a custard. You know, it's cheese and sugar and eggs and egg yolks. And so, you know, you want to cook it gently because the risk is that if you're cooking at too high of a heat for too long of a temperature, without that insulation, it's going to curdle. Yeah. And that's gross. I think we can both agree.
I'm with you there. That is gross.
That is not what you want. I mean, and we have recipes, like a lot of recipes for cheesecake on our site because people request them. And we have, you know, like pumpkin cheesecakes. We've got like... I'm sure we have chocolate cheesecake. Irish cream cheesecake, I think. Cannoli cheesecake. Like we have explored a lot of cheesecake possibilities.
I mean, and today's guest is Carla Hall, who is like no stranger to the cheesecake. She's developed lots of cheesecake recipes over the course of her career. Yeah. You know, lots of variations. And she had some interesting thoughts about like how to tweak sort of the base recipe. That's exciting. Yeah, it's great.
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Chapter 5: Why might cheesecake crack during baking?
And it was some insane number.
I bet collectively it was 5,000. For myself individually, it may have been 3,000. I mean, I don't know, because you divide that by five people. And we had multiple dishes on each episode, like at least three. And we did 1,300 episodes. 1,300 episodes.
Oh, my God. That sounds tiring. Were there. So, you know, the thing about cheesecake is that it's insanely popular. Yes. Like people love cheesecake. The secret's going to come out at some point in this episode that cheesecake is actually not my top dessert.
And it's not mine either. It's not. It's not. However, my husband loves cheesecake. My wife loves cheesecake. So I think that as somebody who cooks, when you know people who love a thing, it doesn't matter if you like it or not. You want to make it good for them.
So I imagine in the 3,000 recipes that you did for The Chew, and then you have cookbooks, you have your magazine, you've probably developed a cheesecake or two in your time.
You know, or 10.
Yeah.
Yes. Correct.
Do you have a favorite cheesecake that you've made or like a dud?
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Chapter 6: What are the common cheesecake variations and styles?
Now. And what do you do for the crust? I do graham cracker. Sometimes I'm like, oh, I have some ginger snaps. I have some shortbread. So I'll mix it up. I always want to do the sour cream on top, which he really does not like.
Okay, so this is a regional variation, right? So it's a graham cracker crust, dense cream cheese custard, and then a layer of very lightly sweetened sour cream across the top.
I think the sour cream breaks up the cream cheese. I'm just saying. What this cream cheese needs is a little more dairy. Right, but I want that tang. so that you're breaking up the richness of the cream cheese. I think, you know, we're talking about sweet cheesecakes. You know, savory cheesecakes are a thing. Oh, they are a thing. Are they a good thing? All of these baking shows on... Sure.
It was holiday baking, and somebody had done a savory cheesecake. Now... We loved it. I don't know if it's because it was savory in the midst of all of the sugar. I am not a fan of blue cheese, but blue cheese with friends and cream cheese, it was gorgeous. It was with candied walnuts, and there was honey, and there was also fig.
I mean, so it was... That sounds delicious to me, and I think it could sort of... You know how in the French tradition, it's like cheese followed by dessert, cheese as dessert. I could see that being a very elegant sort of conclusion. And in some ways, that makes more sense to me than traditional cheesecake, I guess.
So, you know, this episode where you have all of these cheesecakes to judge, like what were the judges sort of looking for? Like what's a perfect cheesecake?
I think, first of all, balance. Sweet, savory, salty, a little bit of bitter. There's a balance in flavor. There's also balance in texture. And I think that's where the crust comes in, where you really want to have the balance between balance. the right amount of butter and a little bit of sweetness in that crust. When we are doing those shows, it's all about something looking really good.
They have the opportunity to not just have a plain cheesecake with fruit on top. So now you're getting into, you get to add texture, you get to add more flavor. That's when you balance it with whatever you put on top of the cheesecake. It was You can hide your shame. You can hide your shame. If it's a spider crack, great. If it is a long crack in the middle, if it didn't bake through.
How do you know when your cheesecake is properly baked? What are you looking for jiggle-wise or not jiggle-wise?
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Chapter 7: How can you make a cheesecake without a springform pan?
Give us a preview of coming attractions. Talk to me about this book. What you learned in the process of writing a baking book. Because, you know, it's hard. It's different than writing a cookbook.
Baking is hard. And I really thought this one was going to take me down. And I don't have a single cheesecake in that book. I know.
What? It's like you don't care about your husband at all.
For me, baking is like casual Friday. I love... I've done all these shows, but I really... I enjoy sweets. It is sweet and savory. It is about making something. I will give you a recipe and list how you can change it.
So there's a little choose-your-own-adventure element to it.
What took so long... And I'm going to... Every time I was doing a recipe, and I'm doing metric as well as cups and everything. Good for you. I'd love to hear that. I want the book to come with a freaking scale. I spent the time, y'all, to do this for you.
I am with you. That's why baking with a scale is so important. We'll know that when we bake your recipes using your measurements, it's going to turn out the way that you intended. Exactly. It's about ratios. I'm so glad that you said that because here at King Arthur, we are big boosters for the scale as the one true way.
The one true way. And I tell you, I just want to gush a little bit on the big King A. Because when I give my recipes, especially my biscuits, use King Arthur flour.
I love to hear this.
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Chapter 8: What unique cheesecake recipes are discussed in this episode?
Find out about all of our stores at kingarthurbaking.com slash visit.
It's time for our next segment, Ask the Bakers. For Ask the Bakers, we want to hear from you. If you have a baking question for us, head to kingarthurbaking.com slash podcast to record a voice message, and we may end up using it on the show. That's kingarthurbaking.com slash podcast.
And of course, if you have a question that you simply cannot wait, you can always reach out to our Baker's Hotline via phone, email, or online chat. Just go to kingarthurbaking.com slash bakers dash hotline. That's kingarthurbaking.com slash bakers dash hotline. Or call us 855-371-BAKE. That's 371-2253, 2-2-5-3 as in bake.
Awesome. Let's hear our questions.
Yeah.
Hi, this is Danielle. And this is Russell. And we are based in Brooklyn, New York. We just made the pumpkin basque cheesecake. I was very inspired by your fall baking episode. So thank you for that. I loved that for this recipe, we just had to throw all the ingredients into the food processor and let the food processor do the magic. Are there any other...
recipes like cheesecake recipes specifically where that is how you do it. Um, Russell and I have, we're very into making cheesecakes, so, um, would love to experiment there. And, and why is it called a Basque cheesecake? Like what's the history there? Um, I would love to learn a little bit more about that. And I guess final question. We normally do a water bath with our cheesecake.
I noticed in this recipe it didn't specify to do a water bath, so we did not do the water bath. Would that have made a difference? Yeah, would that have made a difference? All right, that's all for now. But thank you for the podcast. Big fan of King Arthur over here. Bye. Bye.
Those people have only been dating for six months. You don't get that kind of like energy that like, oh, we are so happy and so in love with each other. We're making cheesecake together.
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