This recipe makes a gingerbread cake that is both light and flavorful, making it perfect for the holidays.
| Prep Time: | 30 mins |
| Additional Time: | 2 hrs 30 mins |
| Total Time: | 3 hrs |
| Servings: | 16 |
| Yield: | 16 servings |
Ingredients
- 1 (9 ounce) package chocolate wafer cookies, finely crushed
- ½ cup butter, melted
- 1 ½ cups boiling water
- 2 (3 ounce) packages JELL-O Cherry Flavor Gelatin
- 1 (8 ounce) package PHILADELPHIA Cream Cheese, softened
- 2 ½ cups thawed COOL WHIP Whipped Topping, divided
- 2 ounces BAKER’S Semi-Sweet Chocolate, shaved into curls
- 2 ¼ cups fresh dark sweet cherries, pitted
- 1 teaspoon powdered sugar
Instructions
- Heat oven to 350 degrees F.
- Mix cookie crumbs and butter; press onto bottom of 13×9-inch pan. Bake 12 to 15 min. or until firm. Cool.
- Meanwhile, add boiling water to gelatin mixes in small bowl; stir 2 min. until completely dissolved. Whisk cream cheese in large bowl until blended. Gradually whisk in gelatin. Refrigerate 30 min. or until chilled.
- Whisk 1 cup COOL WHIP into gelatin mixture; pour over crust. Refrigerate 2 hours or until firm.
- Spread remaining COOL WHIP over dessert; top with chocolate curls and cherries. Garnish with sifted powdered sugar just before serving.
- This colorful cherry-chocolate dessert is a great treat to share with friends and family. One pan makes enough for 16 servings.
- Warm chocolate by microwaving it on HIGH for a few seconds or just until you can smudge the chocolate with your thumb. Hold the chocolate piece steadily, then draw a vegetable peeler slowly over the flat bottom of the chocolate piece, allowing a thin layer of chocolate to curl as it is peeled off the bottom to make long, delicate curls.
- Line empty pan with parchment or foil, with ends of paper extending over sides. Use to prepare dessert as directed. When ready to serve, use parchment handles to lift cooled dessert from pan before cutting into pieces.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 261 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 30 g |
| Cholesterol | 31 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 1 g |
| Protein | 3 g |
| Saturated Fat | 9 g |
| Sodium | 238 mg |
| Sugars | 20 g |
| Fat | 15 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
odd texture inside, also 9 oz of crust was not enough for a 13×9 pan. I had to use a bread pan and then there was too much cherry. I substituted chocolate chips instead of chocolate shavings and it added a nice crunch. Also used canned cherries and they helped add another pop of cherry.
Made this as written with strawberry jello (hubby doesn’t like cherries). If you are a lover of dark chocolate then you will like this recipe. The crust overpowered everything else IMO. I did find the chocolate wafer cookies….they are expensive, $5/9 oz. box and you need a whole box. It was difficult to tell when it was done. The center layer was very firm, almost too firm. Whipped topping complemented the center layer but not the cookie layer. Not my cup of tea but my husband loved it. I’ll stick to a Graham cracker crust, 6 oz. Jello box, double the water, 8 oz. Cream cheese and 3-4 cups whipped topping. I may even skip the top whipped topping layer.
I would more accurately give this recipe a 4 1/2 stars but thats not an option so I rounded up. I would remove a half star do to either my mistake or recipe flaw. Overall the taste was great, it looked awesome and it wasnt heavy. Mistakes or changes I had to make: 1. Crust – Could not find chocolate wafers anywhere so I substituted Oreo. Which then that brought into question the amount due to different cookie and the white filling of the cookie. I crushed 14 ounces of Oreo’s and kept the butter amount the same. I am not a baker of desserts so it said to bake the crust but for me it was hard to determine when its done. Mine tasted great, but was so hard you couldn’t hardly cut it with a fork, which made it hard to eat. Once you were chewing it, it wasn’t any harder than an Oreo, but imagine cutting an Oreo cooke with a fork…not good. Not sure if it was suppose to be that hard or if I had too many Oreos or if i cooked it too long or just the fact my substitution wasn’t a good choice, but it tasted great. 2. Taste – was great however I did expect a little stronger cherry flavor. Not sure if would add more jello mix or reduce cream cheese, but that taste as is was great, just not obvious cherry. 3. Presentation – It looked awesome, but I am still a practical person. I did not use fresh cherry because to me it looked out of place and just woulnt fit with the dessert. I used a soft sweet Cherry out of a can and those look a little more like a small prune than a cherry, but