Colm O'Gorman: A genius recipe for an autumn-berry cheesecake

Colm's autumn berry cheesecake

This beautiful dessert is based upon a genius recipe from Honey & Co, a family-run London café and restaurant group who serve beautiful Middle Eastern-inspired food. 

If you have been lucky enough to eat at one of their cafes and restaurants, you may have tasted the Feta and Honey Cheesecake that has become their signature dish. 

I first tasted this dessert a year ago, and I have never forgotten it. I have always wanted to develop a home version, using more locally available ingredients, and with the abundance of autumn berries available at the moment, I decided to go for it this week.

This really is a reinvented as opposed to deconstructed cheesecake. The Honey & Co original is served on a bed of buttery baked kadaifi pastry, a shredded filo, but as that is difficult to source here in Ireland, my version uses a buttery, crisp baked crumble as the base.

My recipe uses lots of local ingredients. The strawberries are locally grown, and I picked the blackberries from the ditches along the lane where we live. 

I used local honey from Wild About here in North Wexford, and cream cheese from Killowen Farm in Enniscorthy. 

There are some lovely feta-style Irish cheeses on the market, Meadowfield Farm here in Wexford do a lovely tangy goat’s milk version which I used when making my cheesecake. 

Supervalu stocks Killowen Farm cream cheese, and my local store also stocks the Meadowfield feta-style goat’s cheese. 

If you are struggling to get hold of either you can of course use other brands, just make sure to use a full-fat cream cheese and the best quality feta you can find. 

Lower-quality feta will not blend as smoothly, and you may end up with a slightly grainy texture to your cheesecake cream.

This dessert is a lovely balance of flavours and textures, a perfect combination of sweet with a little saltiness, crunchy and creamy textures, and the freshness of berries. You can use other soft fruit if you wish. 

Honey & Co often serve their Feta and Honey Cheesecake with blueberries or peaches which are fabulous as a topping. 

I have also experimented with some apples pan-roasted in butter, sugar, and brandy which I have served under the cream and then topped off with fresh blackberries. That too was lovely.

Autumn Berry Cheesecake

recipe by:Colm O'Gorman

Bursting autumn fruits meet creamy cheesecake.

Servings

4

Preparation Time

 20 mins

Cooking Time

 15 mins

Total Time

 35 mins

Course

 Dessert

Ingredients

• Crumble base:

• 80g plain flour

• 80g demerara or muscovado sugar

• 75g butter

• 20g oat flakes

• 20g blanched or flaked almonds

• ½ tsp flaky sea salt

• Cheesecake cream:

• 160g cream full fat cream cheese

• 160ml thick double cream

• 50g good quality feta cheese

• 1 tsp vanilla essence

• 50g runny honey

• To finish:

• 200g strawberries

• 125g blackberries

• A handful of roasted almonds

• A drizzle of runny honey

Method

1. Cut the butter into small cubes and pop it into a bowl along with the flour, oat flakes and the sugar. Use your fingertips to rub the butter into the dry ingredients until you have a mixture with the consistency of breadcrumbs. Roughly chop the blanched almonds and stir those into the crumble.

2. Spread the crumble over a baking tray lined with greaseproof baking paper and bake it in a preheated oven at 180 Celsius for about fifteen minutes. It is ready when the crumble is dark and toasted and the sugar has caramelised. Remove the tray from the oven and transfer the sheet of paper with the crumble to a wire rack to cool.

3. Roast a handful of whole almonds in the oven for the last five minutes of the cooking time for your crumble. Remove the almonds from the oven when they are nicely roasted and set aside for now. You will use them to finish the dessert when plating up.

4. Time now to make the cheesecake mixture. Crumble the feta cheese and pop it into a large bowl along with all the other ingredients for the cheesecake mixture. Use a spatula to combine them thoroughly, stirring with big circular motions until the mixture thickens to a good consistency. As you begin to stir, you may think the mixture will be too runny, but do not worry, it will thicken as you go. Just keep stirring it with the spatula until you get it to the correct consistency. Too check the consistency, remove a scoop of the cream, and turn the spoon upside down. If the cream mixture stays stuck to the spoon, it is perfect.

5. Making the cheesecake cream will only take a few minutes. Do not whisk this mixture, you do not want to get any air into the cream. The genius of this technique from Honey & Co is the lovely smooth texture of the cheesecake cream. Use a large spoon or spatula to mix it and you will get the perfect result.

6. By now the baked crumble should have cooled, so use your hands to break it up into large irregular sized pieces. Wash the berries, and cut some of the strawberries into halves, leaving the stalks for decoration, cutting the rest into quarters. Leave the blackberries whole. When you are ready to serve, arrange some of the crumble on a plate. Add a generous serving of the cheesecake cream on top of the crumble. Add the strawberries and scattering of blackberries to each portion. Finish with a light drizzle of runny honey and the roasted almonds.