Nutella Cheesecake bars!

A friend of mine introduced me to this recipe:
http://www.lovintheoven.com/2011/03/nutella-cheesecake-gooey-cake-bars.html

It sounded delicious but I was concerned by the 1/2 cup of butter and 16 oz (!!!) of powdered sugar in the top layer. It just sounded like too much, and especially too sweet. After some searching, I found out that this was a Paula Deen recipe, which explains oh so much. I was afraid that making this recipe would set me down Paula Deen's patented Road to Diabetes, so I decided to mess around with the recipe to reduce the sugar.

Then I thought, hmm, why not just make the top layer a real cheesecake layer? I looked at some regular Nutella cheesecake recipes and adapted them to my purposes.
Next, I had to figure out how to make the "1 box chocolate cake mix" from scratch, since I don't like boxed cake mixes. I found something for that too.

And we're off!!

Here is the recipe I came up with:
Bottom layer:

2 ¼ cup flour

½ cup cocoa powder

1 ½ cup sugar

1 ½ tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 egg

½ cup butter, melted

1 tsp vanilla

Top layer:

16 oz cream cheese (softened)

1 cup Nutella

1 tsp vanilla

3 eggs

½ cup sugar

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Make bottom layer: Mix together dry ingredients, then add the melted butter, egg and vanilla. Stir until incorporated, then pat into the bottom of a lightly buttered 13 x 9 in. pan.

3. Make top layer: Beat cream cheese and Nutella until smooth. Add eggs, vanilla and sugar and beat until combined, scraping down sides of bowl as needed.  Carefully spread on top of the cake layer.

3. Bake 35-45 min.

4. Let cool completely.

I accidentally overbaked it slightly, but the flavor is still great. Sweet and delicious without being overly sweet. I think I might increase the Nutella slightly for next time. You can never have too much Nutella.  :)

Next project: These amazingly evil peanut butter cup and oreo cupcakes.

http://melssweetlife.wordpress.com/2012/01/22/peanut-butter-oreo-cupcakes/