Eggnog Cheesecake Bars

Eggnog Cheesecake Bars

To me, there isn't much better holiday taste (for Christmas anyways!) than eggnog. Eggnog has that little hint of spice that just melts in your mouth, doesn't it? Eggnog desserts are one of my favorite foods to make and guess who else in the house is an eggnog food lover? That's right … it's my little (normally) picky eater. 🙂 Which makes me love coming up with eggnog dessert ideas even more as it's something that we have in common. YUM!

So, as I was looking for inspiration through my other eggnog recipes (my eggnog cookies are HUGE this time of year and this eggnog cake is always a personal favorite) I thought about making some eggnog cookie bars.

Our son loves my pumpkin bars, so for sure he's bound to love these eggnog cookie bars! And, of course, to complicate matters and make this eggnog dessert recipe even more delicious, we have to add something else in, right? Cheesecake is exactly what I was missing from the eggnog cookie dessert bars – and adding that in along with a crumble, is what this eggnog food lover called for this holiday season.

Here's how I whipped these delicious eggnog cheesecake bars up:

• 1 vanilla cake mix
• 1/3 cup butter, melted
• 1/3 cup AE Egg Nog
• 1/4 teaspoon rum extract

• 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup AE Egg Nog
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

• 2/3 cup brown sugar
• 3 T melted butter

This recipe is really simple. In fact, the part that took the longest was getting out the ingredients and putting them all away. But, that's always the worst part of cooking and baking, isn't it!?

My kitchen right before popping these in the oven:

On to the directions for this amazing eggnog dessert.

Start by preheating your oven to 350 degrees, this comes together super fast. Spray your baking dish with non-stick spray. Mix all of the ingredients for the cookie layer. Once it forms a cookie dough, press the cookie dough into a dish. I used a 9×13 which is the perfect size for this recipe.

In the pictures you can see my little helper. We love baking and cooking together and I love the memories we make. Yes, we even have matching aprons. 🙂

Once the cookie layer is pressed into the dish, whip together your cheesecake layer ingredients. You'll want to use a hand mixer for this part, it takes a bit for them to be combined and you want it all to be mixed pretty well. Layer the cheesecake mixture on top of the cookie layer. It's fairly thick, don't be alarmed. It's supposed to be that way.