This highly-requested key lime cheesecake recipe eluded me for years. Three years, to be exact. While you might think that it would be as simple as adding a splash of lime juice and zest to my classic cheesecake recipe, it turns out that is absolutely not the case. Simply adding lime juice actually negatively affected the texture; made it too mealy, too airy for what should be a smooth and creamy custard, and resulted in a lackluster lime flavor that was lost beside the tang of the cream cheese. I went through dozens of boxes of said cream cheese before repeatedly, begrudgingly, tabling the recipe to perfect at a later time. The key lime cheesecake breakthrough finally came when I cracked the code for my lemon cheesecake recipe. Rather than simply adding juice (which contains a great deal of water and results in the awkward texture), cooking the juice into a curd results in a smooth, creamy custard. Equally importantly, it also yields bright key lime flavor that’s not too sour with j...