(everything else) under the sun: Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake

So last month for my boyfriend's birthday, I made him a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake. If you like peanut butter and chocolate, then this ones for you. However, I will warn you that it gets costly to make!!

Here is a picture I took right before serving (it was hard trying to get a picture with everyone drooling over it!)

Crust:

1 full tray of Oreos (crush in food processor)
1 cup of chopped roasted peanuts (crush in food processor)
1/2 cup of butter, melted

Filling:

4 packages of 8oz cream cheese, softened
5 eggs, room temperature
1.5 cups of firmly packed brown sugar
1 cup of smooth peanut butter
1/2 cup of whipping cream
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
10-12 Reese's Peanut Butter Cups - broken into pieces

Topping:

3 ounces of sour cream
1/2 cup of sugar
a bag of Mini Reese's Peanut Butter Cups
a handful of semi-sweet chocolate chips and remaining whipping cream

What to do (you'll need to make this a head of time because the cheesecake needs to be refrigerated for at least 4 hours - I kept mine in the fridge over night):

Crust:

Combine the crushed Oreos and peanuts with the melted butter
Pat into bottom of springform pan and up sides. (The recipe I used said to use a 10 inch pan - I just used whatever one I had home, no idea of it's size)

Filling:

Beat cream cheese in a bowl (using paddle attachment) until smooth. I added each package one at a time.
Add eggs, one at a time, making sure they have been beaten well before adding the next one.
Add sugar, peanut butter and cream; mixing until smooth

side note: *make sure you get all of the lumps out of cream cheese mixture - I had to mix and stir, mix and stir a few times before all the cream cheese lumps had disappeared*

Stir in vanilla and then fold in your broken peanut butter cup pieces
Pour your delicious filling into your prepared crust.

next side note: *cheesecake is cooked in a water bath*

Place springform pan into a larger baking pan - I used a square roaster. I wrapped tin foil all around the bottom and sides of my springform pan so that no water could get into the bottom of my pan.
Pour hot water into larger pan so that water is about 1 inch up the side of the springform pan.
Put that cakey happiness in the oven and bake at 275°F for 1.5 hours.
Make sure the cake is cooked in the middle - it took about 1 hour and 45 minutes for mine to cook.
Be veryyyy careful removing the cake in the water bath from the oven- it will need to be returned to the oven if you decide to use the sour cream glaze.

Topping:

Combine the sour cream and sugar and spread on the cheesecake.
Return to oven for about 5 minutes.
Remove from the oven and let cool for an hour
I ran a knife along the edge of the pan to loosen the cake, placed it on a cake tray and refrigerated over night
Before serving, I chopped my mini Reese Peanut Butter Cups in half and placed them all around the cake (they will stick because of the sour cream glaze)
I then melted my chocolate chips and whipping cream in a bowl over a boiling pot (but I'm sure the microwave will work too) and drizzled that goodness all over the cake.

And ta-da: