I wanted to do something a little wild and crazy today. So I went with this mini Cranberry Cheesecake, my first selection ever from Magnolia Bakery.
For years I have been wanting to paint a Magnolia treat, but either the baked goods didn’t look “pretty” enough or there were too many people waiting in line crowded around the cases blocking the view. Magnolia Bakery is very popular in Manhattan!
In December, I took the train into Manhattan to meet my friend Dennis for lunch at the United Nations before he retires, and it was earlier than usual to allow time to go through extensive security checks.
I walked by the Magnolia stand in Grand Central Station and saw rows of these beauties – and no one blocking the view. Full disclosure: As you can see here, the proper title of this is Vanilla Bean Cheesecase with Cranberry Topping. A bit cumbersome for my purposes.
It was my lucky day. All the stores in Grand Central looked stunning and were stocked to the gills for the holidays. This was the same day I spotted the Day 7. Rugelach. I also found these multicolored olives, which I was considering for a painting, but thought it might come out looking too psychedelic to be believable.
Cranberry Cheesecake was much more fun to paint, although I admit to having doubts about this two hours into it. However, I kept plugging away with strong encouragement from Bonnie, who somehow knew this would work. After many hours it came together.
I experimented with the cascading berries and dripping juice, taking creative license and adding some of both. I picked a light blue background for some contrast to the cheesecake, but not too much so the cranberries could “pop”.
The trick was to paint the cheesecake itself in first so I could play with the translucent glaze. I uses various shades of red and layers of alizaron crimson, which is what made the darker berries 3-dimensional. The more alizaron I used, the more depth there was, and the more this painting came alive. It’s all about the highlights!
Thanks for coming by today!
