I'm In Love

I've told you before how I use food to show affection; in that case, I must love you people very very much. This is The Recipe you've waited all your lives for, The Recipe to end All Recipes; this is what you will want to eat for the rest of your life (probably considerably shortening it in the process; I can't be blamed if you die of vitamin deficiencies or whatever). This is the recipe I make repeatedly at the slightest excuse, and this is the recipe I made on Saturday for a potluck dinner with my friends before we all go our separate ways to university.

But you know, if you wanted to make it, you wouldn't need a momentous occasion like that. After the first time, you get good at making up occasions. You start inviting people round specially and pretending it's a big deal when really you see them every other day/they deliver your post. In my family, we started off making this recipe because it was Christmas, and finished up making it because it was Tuesday.

I've wanted to blog about this cheesecake more or less since Happy Love Strawberry was created (actually, it might have been the reason it was created; I forget) but as it's usually made for a big occasion there's never a chance for decent photos, and I really wanted to do this justice. And then, of course, I got my beautiful Nikon D40, and -- actually, it might have been the reason I got the Nikon D40, too. Hm.

Ohh, look at that texture. That's worth buying £300 worth of camera for.

I can only go on about this cheesecake before so long before you all want to beat my face in with a shovel (er, a surprisingly violent imagination just emerged there) so I will say only this: make this. Make this now. Make this if you want everyone who tastes it to fall in love with you. Make it to celebrate your birthday/Christmas/Easter/wedding/funeral/diabetes diagnosis -- okay, perhaps not that one.

The first person who comments and says 'I made this and I didn't like it...' gets their face beaten in with a shovel. I simply won't believe you.

White Chocolate & Raspberry Cheesecake
Recipe adapted from The People's Cookbook, as seen in Good Food magazine (July 07).
Serves 12

For the base:
85g (3oz) digestive biscuits, crushed (Americans; graham crackers. I usually use 100g of each for the base cause I like a little bit more)
85g (30z) ginger nut biscuits, crushed
85g (3oz) butter, melted

For the filling:
500g (1lb 2oz) white chocolate, broken into pieces
50g (2oz) butter
1/2 vanilla pod, split lengthways
500g (1lb 2oz) full fat soft cheese
50g caster sugar
175ml whipping cream
225g punnet fresh raspberries, plus extra to decorate

1. For the base, combine biscuits & butter, then press into the base of a 23cm (9.5") springform tin.

2. For the filling, put the chocolate, butter and vanilla pod in a heatproof bowl and microwave in 20-second bursts to melt it. Allow to cool slightly.

3. In another bowl, mix the soft cheese, sugar and whipping cream til smooth.

4. Remove the vanilla pod from the chocolate mixture and stir the chocolate into the cream. Gently stir in raspberries with a spatula, then spoon on top of the base, smooth carefully, and leave in the fridge to set (8-24 hours).

5. Remove from tin and decorate with raspberries to serve.

I go to uni on Saturday, so blog posts may be sporadic for a while - I'm hoping to get in this month's Daring Baker challenge but time might be against me this week. Bear with me a bit and I'll be back with part two of the sugarcraft flower tutorial soon ^__^.

Also, I made a Flickr account! I'm not sure why. But it makes me feel cool.

Yeah, I ate this. Win.