Home-bakers are in absolute love with a recent recipe that surfaced on Delicious Magazine recently.
The recipe is for a gin and tonic flavoured cheesecake and features a zingy layer of gin and tonic-flavoured jelly on top of a creamy mascarpone middle and a caramelised biscuit base.
It sounds like the perfect dessert for these warmer evening we are having!
Ingredients
THE BASE:
- 250g pack Lotus Biscoff caramelised biscuits (or for us Kiwis, just 1 packet plain wine or digestive biscuits crumble)
- 80g butter, melted
- 2 x 280g packs cream cheese (original recipe uses Philadelphia)
- 500g mascarpone
- 80g caster sugar
- Grated zest and juice 1 lemon
- Grated zest 1 lime, juice ½
- Grated zest ½ orange
GIN & TONIC LAYER:
- 6 gelatine leaves
- 2 wide strips pared zest and juice 2 lemons
- 2 wide strips pared zest and juice 1 orange
- Juice 1 lime
- 100g caster sugar
- 6 juniper berries, bruised
- 4 tbsp gin
- 300ml tonic water
- A few fresh lemon thyme sprigs, plus extra to decorate
- Fresh raspberries and a splash gin to serve
Method:
- Put the biscuits in a food processor and whizz to fine crumbs. Pour in the melted butter and whizz until mixed. (If you don’t have a food processor, put the biscuits in a food bag, seal and bash to fine crumbs using a rolling pin, then mix with the melted butter in a bowl.) Tip the buttery crumbs into the cake tin and smooth the base using the back of a spoon. Put on a baking sheet (in case a little butter leaks out) and keep in the fridge to firm up while you make the topping.
- Put the cream cheese, mascarpone, 80g sugar, grated zests and the lemon and lime juice in a large mixing bowl, then beat with an electric mixer until smooth. Spoon on top of the chilled biscuit base and level the surface with a spatula. Cover with cling film and chill for 2 hours or until the filling has set firm.
- For the gin and tonic layer, put the gelatine leaves in a small bowl of cold water for 5-10 minutes to soften. Put the lemon, orange and lime juice in a small heavy-based saucepan with the pared zests, sugar and juniper berries. Heat gently to dissolve the sugar and infuse the flavours. Strain into a bowl (discard the zests and berries) and keep warm. Squeeze out the water from the gelatine leaves, then whisk, one by one, into the warm citrus syrup until dissolved. Add the gin and tonic, whisk a little to mix, then pour over the chilled cheesecake layer. Scatter over a few lemon thyme sprigs, then leave to set in the fridge, covered with cling film, for at least 4 hours or overnight if you like.
- When ready to serve, mix the raspberries in a bowl with the gin, then leave to infuse for 10 minutes. Scatter some fresh lemon thyme sprigs over the cheesecake, then serve with the gin-soaked raspberries alongside.
Some of these ingredients can be a little tricky to find in NZ, but if you're a confident home-baker then you will easily be able to swap them out for more easily sourced ingredients.
