Recipes

This Cherry Cheesecake with a chocolate base was one of the dishes entered into FoodLoversBritain.com's CherryBake on National Cherry Day at Borough Market. Steve Mannell used a mixture of British cherry varieties in this cake, along with cherry brandy, which can be bought from Rent A Cherry Tree in Sussex.

For the Base

    200g digestive biscuits
    100g dark chocolate
    100g butter
    6 tbsp caster sugar
   
For the Vanilla Cream Cheese

    400g cream cheese
    6tbsp icing sugar
    juice of 1/2 lemon
    1 vanilla pod, split
    600ml double cream

For the Filling

    A selection of British cherries
    British Cherry Brandy
   

Method

Make the base. Grind the digestive biscuits up in a food processor. Melt the butter and chocolate in a bain marie or double boiler and combine with the biscuits. Firmly push the mixture into the bottom of a greased cake tin and leave to cool before refrigerating for at least 1 hour.

Meanwhile, wash and de-stone the cherries. If possible, inject the cherries with cherry brandy using a syringe. If this is not possible, flambe the cherries in the brandy instead.

Now make the vanilla cream cheese. Put the cream cheese and icing sugar in a bowl. Squeeze in the lemon juice and scrape in the seeds from the vanilla pod. Beat until smooth. In a separate bowl, whip the double cream to soft peaks and fold into the cream cheese mixture.

Once the base has cooled and solidified, remove from the fridge and scatter the brandied cherries over the top. Spread over the vanilla cream cheese mixture and return to the fridge to cool and set, preferably overnight. Serve at room temperature, decorated with fresh cherries.