Hi, Can you make this cheese cake with REAL cream cheese? I live in Central Europe, where cream cheese is made with CREAM and not with stabilizers, emulsifiers, guar gum and other oddities - nothing you don't find on the farm is added. Only in the past year or so has the famous stuff in the silver box come into the market here (at ridiculous prices). I'm afraid that after ten years of eating REAL cream cheese (either made at home on someone's farm or bought in any grocery store - it's all the same simple, old-fashioned FRESH cream cheese), I'm spoiled. The silver-wrapped stuff looks like library paste, feels like slime in the mouth and tastes like... nothing much. It's too chalky-white, too gummy/slimy (ever notice how it hardens up into a crust if you leave a bit of it exposed to air?) and just doesn't taste like cream. So, does anyone make cheese cake anymore in the US with REAL cream cheese? Or does 'cheesecake' in the US mean 'library-paste in a silver wrapper' cake? Would using the real thing make the cake different? I'd like to try this because all the cooks I know over here are keeping mum about their mother's and grandmother's and aunt's and great-aunt's recipes for their fabulous cheese cakes, and I'd like to make a real, baked cheese cake myself. But I just won't eat that stuff in a silver wrapper anymore. Do the various additives do anything necessary to this cake? Thanks. Nel: I envy you your access to the real McCoy, so to speak. I think you should be able to use this recipe without too much trouble. The only variable would be how much moisture your real cheese has vs. the "silver slab". If you feel you need to make an adjustment (try the recipe as is, first), I'd suggest the same tweaks that I recommended above for mascarpone: an additional tablespoon or two of flour in the filling, or an additional egg to help the filling set better. Good luck, and I wish I could be there for a taste!! Susan

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