Recipe: Jamie Oliver Baked Chocolate Cheesecake

I used to always make this cheesecake for special occasions or if I was asked to make a dessert for a pot luck (bring a plate) dinner. As I had a pretty significant birthday (30!) in the weekend, I thought why not! I haven't made it in a while as it's very decadent, and makes a really large cake! If you haven't tried a baked cheesecake before, you're really missing out! It has a lovely smooth, velvety texture that melts in your mouth. 

The recipe for it is from a magazine I was reading at work. Jamie Oliver wrote a weekly recipe column for them. I photocopied it and have been using it ever since! I've never seen it in any of Jamie cookbooks though. We have seven (!) of his books and this recipe  isn't any of them. 

I heart Jamie....

I'm also really not sure why it's called a chocolate cheesecake- apart from the fact it uses Maltesers and a block of chocolate in the centre. I'm a chocolate fiend however so I'm happy to call it that!

Hot out of the oven, ready to chill in the fridge

Jamie Oliver's Chocolate Cheesecake 

(Serves 8)

Ingredients

250g plain digestive biscuits

2 handfuls of Maltesers

150g unsalted butter

600g cream cheese

170g caster sugar

500mL sour cream

4 large eggs, separated 

2 tablespoons vanilla extract/essence

zest of 2 oranges

250g chocolate, broken into small pieces

Method

Preheat oven to 170°C

Line a 24cm spring-form tin with baking paper. Smash up the biscuits and one handful of the Maltesers by hand or in a food processor. Mix in the melted butter and press the mixture firmly into the cake tin with a spoon. 

In a large bowl, whip the cream cheese, caster sugar, sour cream, egg yolks, vanilla essence and orange zest until smooth and light.

In a separate bowl mix the egg whites until firm. Carefully fold the egg whites into the cream cheese mixture along with the broken chocolate pieces. 

Pour the filling into the biscuit base and bake for approximately 50 minutes until the edges of the cheesecake are firm, but the middle wobbly. The top should be golden brown.

Place the cake into the fridge for at least 1hr to set. To serve smash up the remaining Maltesers and sprinkle on top.

Notes:

• Swap the digestive biscuits for any plain sweet biscuit, and also a gluten free biscuit would be fine too. 
• Leave out the chocolate in the cheesecake mixture, and have it more like a plain New York style cake, or substitute for berries
• The cream cheese works fine with the light version, I'm sure you could use a light sour cream too- but to be honest if you're making this dessert, just go all out full fat!
• You can easily make this dessert the day before as it does need quite a while to set. 

I think all these substitutions would be fine, but they will take away from the original flavour of the dessert! 

What are your favourite decadent special occasion desserts??

Not glamorous, but delicious! See below!

***Edit to add 25.5.2016***
It works deliciously if instead of breaking up the chocolate into small pieces, you melt it (either carefully in the microwave or the double boiler method), then after folding in the egg whites, fold in a spoonful of melted chocolate, mix until combined, then pour in the rest of the melted chocolate and stir. You get a sort of layered or marbled effect which is completely divine!