As I have previously mentioned, my husband and I throw a party for the Preakness every year. This year was no exception.  We had one of our smaller crowds in recent memory this year, but it was still fun. We served up two different versions of Black-Eyed Susans: a recipe from the Washington Post and the previous official version served at Pimlico. This year they had a new official version, but my husband didn’t want to buy/make the appropriate ingredients for it so he improvised. I believe four people tasted the test glass of that said it was gross and it was never to be spoken of again. I’m sure it would have been better if he actually made it appropriately.

I also whipped up a batch of pulled pork which is always a hit. This year’s big draw though was the most ridiculous cheesecake ever. Someone I know posted a link to the recipe on Facebook several months ago. I decided I really wanted to make it, but needed an occasion to do so. I decided to make Preakness that occasion. Despite the long sounding list of ingredients and recipe, it only wound up being slightly more labor intensive than making a regular cheesecake. The cheesecake is made with a brownie on the bottom as the crust. As soon as the brownie comes out of the oven you sprinkle it with chocolate chips, peanut butter chips, and cut up Reece’s peanut butter cups. Then top with the peanut butter cheesecake batter. Once that is all cooked decorate with a chocolate/peanut butter ganache and halved peanut butter cups. It was delicious.

A couple comments on the recipe. As mentioned in the blog post the recipe is found in, the recipe for the ganache makes way more than needed. I would go ahead and halve that and you will have more than enough. Second I used a 9-inch springform pan as suggested, but I had a ton of cheesecake better left. I wonder if it might not work better in a 10-inch pan. The crust would obviously be thinner and you would need to adjust the baking times to account for the larger pan, but it might work better to fit all the batter. Also although I’ve heard about the trick before this is the first cheesecake recipe I have ever used that specifically called for it to be baked inside a pan of water. Supposedly that helps the cheesecake from cracking. This is the first time I’ve ever actually tried it, and it is also the first cheesecake I have ever made that didn’t develop a large crack down the middle so I’ll probably try that again in the future with other cheesecake recipes.

In addition to eating we of course enjoyed the race as well. Some people got into the spirit with fancy hats. Tracie and Abby win for the cutest outfits. Apparently all they win is getting a mention in this blog post, but at least that’s something I guess.

We did bet on the races as well. I’m not a bookie so there was no real betting, but you could throw $2 in and draw the name of a horse out of a hat. As there were only 9 horses in the race we had two pools going so there were two winners. Obviously no one went home with crazy winnings, but it was still fun. Sadly it was yet another year with no chance for a Triple Crown winner. I’m always disappointed when that happens as are the people who run The Belmont Stakes I’m sure. I’ll be hoping for one again next year.