Sorry, sorry, I know it’s been a seriously long time since i’ve posted anything again, deepest apologies, but i’m hoping this delicious cheesecake recipe more than makes up for it!!

This is perfect all year round. Cheesecakes aren’t just a summer dessert for me. My mum makes an amazing banana, pecan and caramel baked cheesecake which is one of my earliest memories of a cheesecake and one of the first I ever made. This recipe is fantastic because it’s super versatile, take away the lemon zest and blueberries and you’ve got yourself a perfectly acceptable baked vanilla cheesecake. Nothing wrong with a sweet, easy and simple once to start with. Equally, dress that thing up with some cocoa powder, black pitted cherries, chocolate chips and Crème Chantilly for a decadent Black Forest cheesecake. Whatever you choose to do, this is the recipe for you.

Ingredients

For the base

• 250g of digestive biscuits
• 125g salted butter
• ½ zest of lemon (finely grated)

For the cheesecake mix

• 900g cream cheese (not mascarpone)
• 140g caster sugar
• 200ml double cream
• 6 eggs
• ½ a vanilla pod (scraped)
• Zest of 2 and a ½ lemons (use that last ½)
• 250g fresh blueberries (you can use frozen if you can’t get a hold of fresh)

What you’ll need to do first is set your oven to 180C. Next make your buttery biscuit base(yes i did do that on purpose) by getting all your biscuits into a large food bag and giving them a jolly good whack with a rolling pin. You need to make sure the crumbs are fine, not coarse, there must be nowhere for the cheese mix to leak through when you’re baking it. Put your butter in a microwavable bowl and heat for about 30 seconds until completely melted. Tip your crumbs and lemon zest into a bowl, followed by your butter and mix it all together. It’s best if you use a springform cake tin for this, it makes for easier removal, but any cake tin will do the trick. Make sure it’s well greased and lined (bottom and sides) with greaseproof paper. Using the back of a spoon, press your crumbs into every nook ad cranny of the base, making sure it’s kept even and being very careful to cover the whole base. Pop it in the oven for about 10 minutes until it’s a golden brown. Doing this will make sure you have a gorgeous, crunchy, buttery biscuit base. While that’s in the oven, crack on with your cheese mix. In you same mixing bowl as the base, carefully mix your cheese, cream and sugar until you’ve fully incorporated everything and it’s a smooth, creamy mix. Next mix in your eggs, one by one, until all have been added. Stir in your vanilla, the your lemon zest and finally your blueberries, being as careful as you can not to break any of them. Take your base out of the oven when it’s ready, turn it up to 220C and pour your cheese mixture in, smoothing it evenly as you go. Pop it back into the oven and bake for about 15 minutes until you have a gorgeous golden crust. Then turn the oven down to 130C and cook for another 20 minutes. After this turn the oven off and leave the cheesecake in for about 30 mins. Transfer to the fridge and let it fully cool before cutting into the polka-dotted, lemony goodness. Yes the cooking bit is a faff and takes time, but it’s worth it when you end up with a cheesecake like this! Enjoy it while it lasts, it doesn’t stay on our table for long!