My Favourite Dessert

When I was growing up the weekend dinners were always the same. Every weekend, without fail, we would have a meat filled fry up on Saturday. God, I miss those fry ups here in Sydney. I know you can get rashers and sausages here but they just don’t taste the same as back home. Although, that said, I did receive 1kg of ‘Irish’ sausages from my friend last night. She got them delivered (for free) from an Irish butcher here in Sydney so I will be very keen to try those – when my body is not going through the cleansing cycle of course. I want to invite my Irish friends over for a traditional Irish Breakfast.

Anyway, back to the weekend dinners. On a Sunday we would always have a roast dinner with a fizzy drink (this was the only day we were allowed to have fizzy drinks) and dessert. Dessert was either a chocolate mousse called Angel Delight, which the kids could make while Mum was making the dinner, or Mums delectable cheesecake. This Cheesecake was the highlight of the whole week. It’s to die for and Mum always made it to perfection. I loved every mouthful of it. My Dad would always torment us by trying to steal some off our plates. In fact, I have a memory of my sister eating her cheesecake locked in the toilet because Dad had been chasing her around the house trying to steal some. The recipe for the cheese cake is the one recipe that my Mum has handed down to all her daughters. I always thought she got the recipe from the back of a packet of Philadelphia Cream Cheese but when I asked recently she told me she made it up. She had tried some cheesecake at the restaurant in Brown Thomas and thought she could make a pretty close version of it herself. She experimented with it and came up with our favourite dessert. Not a family occasion goes by now that Mum doesn’t make her cheesecake and it’s still a success (even when eaten in the toilet).

When my guests were here I wanted to make them this cheesecake because it’s quick and easy to make and, let’s be honest, everybody loves cheesecake. I got it into my head that it would be lovely to have little individual cheesecakes for everyone, so I made one big cake and then cut out five individual cakes. I also flaked some chocolate on top and added a Ferrero Rocher for decoration. These went down an absolute treat and the best bit was that after I cut out the five little cakes there were lots of leftover bits for the cook.

Mum's Cheesecake

1 regular size packet of Philadelphia Cream Cheese (is that 200g?)
1 packet of Orange Jelly
1 small tin of Mandarin Segments
1 packet of Digestive Biscuits
30g Butter
3 tblsps of Brown Sugar
Chocolate, to decorate

Crush the biscuits until broken up into very small pieces. Melt the butter and dissolve the brown sugar in the butter. Mix it in with the broken biscuits and then press it into a 20cm springform tin. Place it in the fridge to cool.

Make up the Jelly using the juice from the tin of Mandarins. Make up the rest of the liquid with water. I usually make the jelly with slightly less liquid than the recipe calls for so that it will set firm. Put the Jelly in the fridge for about an hour. You want it to have started to slightly set.

When the jelly has slightly set put it in a liquidizer and add the tin of mandarins and the cream cheese and whooze it all up. Pour this mixture into the chilled biscuits and leave for a few hours to set.

Decorate with flaked chocolate and a Ferrero Rocher on top