A first

It was a weekend of firsts for me. I venture into uncharted territory literally because I made a cake without following a recipe. I have watched enough episodes of Jamie Oliver to know that you can do what you like when you’re making a dinner but when it comes to making desserts it’s more of a science. There was no baking involved in making this cake which considerably cut down the probability of the cake going wrong. I had a new rectangular baking tin that I wanted to use and I had an idea for a lovely strawberry tart. I was thinking maybe shortcrust pastry with a custard filling and strawberries on top. So I’m not quite sure how I came up with this raspberry cheesecake instead.

I did some googling for my Strawberry Tart but stumbled across a more cheese cake type of tart. When I went to buy the strawberries I could only find raspberries so the cake took another turn. I wasn’t too impressed with the amount of sugar etc in the recipe I found through google so I decided to ad lib. It could have all gone horribly wrong but I was in the mood for experimentation.

I was happy with the results - crumbly base, sweet creamy filling, fresh tangy raspberries and crunchy almonds.

You’ll notice the beautiful apron modelled by my good self in the picture below. This was made for me as a birthday present by my good friend C up in Brisbane. It got a first outing at the weekend too.

Raspberry Cheesecake

1 packet digestive biscuits
200g cream cheese
4 cups raspberries
20g butter, melted
2 tblsps brown sugar
4 tlbsps caster sugar
¼ tsp vanilla essence
¼ tsp almond essence
Flaked almonds, toasted

1. Process the biscuits in the food processor until they are fine crumbs. Add the brown sugar and the melted butter and mix until well combined.
2. Grease a rectangular loose bottomed baking tin. Pour the processed biscuits into the tin and pat down with the back of a wooden spoon. Cool in the fridge for an hour
3. Process the cream cheese, 2 tblsps caster sugar, the vanilla essence and the almond essence in a food processor until smooth.
4. Spread on top of the biscuit base and chill for an hour
5. Process 2 cups of raspberries with the remaining 2 tblsps of sugar in the food processor. Spread on top of cream cheese filling
6. Add the raspberries and the toasted almonds on top in layers.
7. Gently remove tart from baking tin and serve