Honey Cheese Cake

By LRay

The English Home, May/June 2015, page 97.

This sophisticated Dessert is adapted from one in Cooing at the Merchant House by Shaun Hill, who is a scholar of classical Greece and its food, as well as a great chef. This is a modern desert, but the idea is similar to the homey cheesecakes that were much eaten by the ancient Greeks.

Ingredients

• Hazelnut Base:
• Digestive Biscuits 4 ounces
• Toasted Hazelnuts, chopped 1 ounce
• Unsalted Butter, plus extra for greasing
• 1 Tablespoon Sugar
• Cream Cheese 14 Ounces
• Sour Cream 1/2 Cup
• Soft-Brown Sugar 3 1/2 Ounces
• Eggs 3
• Honey (ideally a fragrant medium or dark honey, such as thyme, heather or buckwheat)
• Vanilla Extract 1 Teaspoon
• Finely Grated Zest of one Unwaxed Lemon
• For the Topping:
• Cup Sour Cream 1 1/4 Cup
• Vanilla Extract 1 Teaspoon
• Runny Honey 3 Tablespoons (Ideally two or three kinds: light, medium and/or dark)

Details

Adapted from magazine-agent.com-sub.info

Preparation

Step 1

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C and butter a 8 inch springform cake tin. Place the biscuits and nuts in a food processor, and whizz until you have reasonably fine crumbs. Tip the mixture into a mixing bowl. Melt the butter and stir into the crumbs, along with the sugar. Press into the tin, aiming to get an even layer with a lip at the edge. Bake for 7 minutes, the leave to coo..

To make the filling, preheat the oven to 180 decrees C. Place the cream cheese and sour cream in a mixing bowl and stir until well combined. Stir in the sugar and then the eggs, one at a time. Stir in the honey, vanilla and lemon zest.

Pour the mixture into the tine over the cooled base. Bake for about 30 minutes, or until the mixture is firm in the middle. Remove from the oven and leave to cool for 10 minutes.

Turn the oven up to 200 degrees C. To make the topping mix together the sour cream and vanilla extract and spread over the cheesecake. Bake for 5 minutes, or until a glossy top has formed. Leave to cool for at least two hours. You can make this the day before eating and leave it in the fridge, covered, overnight.

To serve, run the tip of a hot knife around the top of the cheese cake and carefully open the springform tin. If the cheesecake splits, just fill in the cracks with a little sour cream. Place on a serving plate. To remove the bottom of the springform tin, slide a large, hot knife between the cheesecake and the metal, then use a large fish slice to transfer to the serving plate.

Decorate the top of the cheesecake just before serving. You can just use one kind of honey ,but two or three kinds looks lovely. Drizzle the light and then the dark honey and marble together in a wavy pattern using the back of a spoon.

Serve on its own, or with fresh fruit such as raspberries.