When it comes time to plan for your next dinner party, and you know you may be at the oven all day, no-bake desserts can be a great option. They will take a bit of preparation the day before, but they’ll be ready to go in the fridge, so you don’t have to be back at the oven once dinner is served. You can make a three-ingredient rich and creamy ice cream, with no advanced tools necessary. Simple, no-bake dirt cake is undeniably delicious, but sort of for the kids. When you want to class it up a little, a no-bake cheesecake might just take the cake, as it were. Just don’t skip this one step. Your cream cheese needs to be at room temperature before mixing.
Getting your cream cheese to room temperature will ensure a smooth filling when you mix it with the other ingredients. Using cream cheese straight from the fridge will result in a filling with cold, unmixed lumps throughout. The creamy texture of a cheesecake relies on the emulsification of the fat in the cream cheese as it mixes with the other ingredients. If your cream cheese is too cold (or too warm), everything won’t emulsify properly, leaving you with a soupy or broken filling. So, you want your cream cheese at room temperature but not melting. It just takes an extra step.
How to get cream cheese to room temp and more tips for no-bake cheesecake
The easiest way to get your cream cheese to the proper temperature is to just leave it out on the counter for about an hour to an hour and a half, unwrapped. It should be soft enough to easily indent with a finger, but not fully slouching into a melt. For a more quickly softened cheese, cut the block into small cubes. And to save even more time, you can submerge cream cheese in warm water (still in the foil wrapper). It can take as little as 10 minutes. You’ll need to flip it a few times to make sure it’s evenly warmed, and you may want to put it in a resealable plastic bag to make sure the wrapper doesn’t leak.
Once your cream cheese is softened, it can take as little as 30 minutes to prep your no-bake cake, although it will require a number of hours to set in the fridge. Don’t overmix your ingredients, or it could break the emulsification of the cream cheese, giving you a soft, not-fully-set filling. Similarly, you should use full fat cream cheese, as low fat ingredients may not fully emulsify and just end up soupy. Let your no-bake cheesecake chill in the fridge for a minimum of five hours, but overnight is ideal, and it could be up to 48 hours.
