Sopapilla Cheesecake Bars

It's fun having blogging friends and celebrating momentous occasions over the blogosphere with them. Today a bunch of other bloggers and I are helping Camilla of Culinary Adventures with Camilla celebrate her 15th wedding anniversary with cheesecake recipes! She originally asked for 15 bloggers to participate, but we ended up with waaaayy more participants, and therefore waaaayy more than #fifteencheesecakes. (Check out the full list of cheesecakes below!)

Cheesecake alone is so easy to make, and adding something special can turn an ordinary cheesecake into something spectacular. In my case, I chose to top it with sopapilla, which is fried dough sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar. I used canned crescent rolls to save some time, but then topped it with a delicious butter, cinnamon and sugar combination to make a crispy, sweet topping. The sopapilla portion of this particular cheesecake doesn't require many extra steps (or ingredients!) and makes an extremely tasty crust for the creamy cheesecake center. Enjoy!

Printable Recipe

Ingredients

2 (8 oz.) cans refrigerated crescent dinner rolls
2 (8 oz.) packages cream cheese, softened
1 1/2 cups sugar, divided
1/2 cup light sour cream
1 egg, lightly whisked
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 tbsp. ground cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Unroll one can of dough. Place in the bottom of a greased 9x13" baking dish. Stretch to cover bottom of dish, firmly pressing seams together to seal.

In medium bowl, beat cream cheese and 1 cup of the sugar with electric mixer on medium speed until smooth. Add sour cream, egg and vanilla and beat until combined. Spread over dough in baking dish.

Unroll the second can of dough. Pinch the seams together and carefully place on top of cream cheese layer.

Pour melted butter over top of the dough and spread so it fully covers the dough.

Mix remaining 1/2 cup sugar with the cinnamon. Sprinkle evenly over butter.

Bake for 30 minutes or until center is set. Allow to cool and then place in the refrigerator to chill completely.

Once chilled, cut into bars. To store, cover and refrigerate.

Source: Adapted from Pillsbury