Gin and Tonic Cheesecake
OH my boozy friends, do I have a treat in stored for you today!!! Are you a Gin and Tonic lover? Do you also enjoy a good slice of cheesecake? Well then your ultimate world has just collided with a BANG!! Yes my dear friends, today I will be sharing with you my ultimate no bake Gin and Tonic Cheesecake recipe! Your taste buds will be on a taste sensation like never before. This is THE dessert to share with your friends (if you must) after a rich and heavy meal. Your palate feels refreshed and vitalized, the cake is light, easy to make and most importantly it is delicious.
My hubby and I, we have this constant battle in our home. Whenever we have some form of booze in the house, all I want to do… is cook with it and all he wants to do… is drink it. He thinks it is a sacrilege cooking with rum, brandy or gin. However, I never hear him complain when I make boozy food. 😀
Since I received this gorgeous bottle of gin from Triple Three Distillery, I have been itching in wanting to experiment with gin in my cooking. You remember my Gin infused Cabbage recipe? Believe me, there are TONS of gin and tonic desserts on the internet. A gin and tonic cheesecake is the one I just couldn’t stop thinking about. So guess who won this round!! Me!! Mwaaaahaaahaaa #EvilLaugh
I adapted the recipe VERY CAUTIOUSLY!! My biggest problem is that I don’t stick to a recipe and with baking that is a must. 3 hours later, I still have a carrot cake in the oven that is now completely burnt on top and utterly raw in the middle. Can you now see my problem? I did however changed things up a little which was within the baking rules.
Firstly, the recipe called for digestive biscuits, but when my eyes caught sight of the Lemon flavoured Tennis Biscuits. I figured… well… I guess you can use any biscuits for the base, so why not lemon tennis biscuits? After thinking… “hmmmm maybe…because the cake has lemon/lime juice, having a hint of lemon flavour in the base can only bring the entire dessert together.” Boy was I right!! It worked!!! YAY!!!
The lemon tennis has a lovely lemon cream flavour without the cream part. It was the best choice for this citrusy boozy cheesecake.
You can use any gin that you like for your gin and tonic cheesecake. You can go crazy with different flavours and colours. How does blood orange or pomegranate sound. The world of flavours is at your finger tips all waiting to be explored.
My only issue was that I didn’t get the prominent gin flavour I was hoping for. I think maybe next time to go with a more neutral tasting cheese base like using marscarpone cheese and double cream instead of cottage cheese or sour cream. The cake was still pretty good!
I could have put in a little extra gin which I was itching to do, but ummmm I have had EXTREMELY bad experiences in the past where my hand…HIC… slipped. Like for example having your 10 year old sister (at the time) pass out at the dinner table because the brandy was a little heavy or a tiramisu turning into a hot mess of sludge and soup because the alcohol prevented it from setting. . . (Note to self: alcohol prevents desserts from setting!)
The Gin and Tonic cheesecake nightmare or was it?
When I got home from my shopping and started unpacking I had heart failures, as my cream cheese magically turned itself into creamed cottage cheese in my shopping bag. I was like NOOOOOOO!!!!! Do I really have to go back to the dreaded shop to make an exchange. I could have sworn I put in Cream Cheese. After a quick FRANTIC google search, I quickly learnt that yes you can use the smooth cottage cheese in a cheesecake. It said that the texture might be slightly different but you can combat it with some double cream or sour cream. Sjoe! A HUGE Sigh of relief!
Just so you know you can use creamed cheese, cottage cheese or marscarpone cheese. If you make a savoury cheesecake well then the world is at your fingertips. (WATCH THIS SPACE…COMING SOON!!)
I also opted to use sour cream instead of normal cream because sour cream just goes so well with lemon and lime. I also thought well, I am braking the rules I might as well just go crazy (well… within limits of course! )
The original recipe called for a gin and tonic syrup with candied lemon/lime slices and broken pieces of meringue decorated all on top of the cake. Out of my guest, it is only my dad and myself that eats meringues. I also kinda felt that this caked needed a little more justice. A gorgeous gin and tonic jelly layer would not only look amazing but add a different texture to the cake. Was just not sure in how I would pull this off, especially when it comes to the quantities. Thankfully for another quick search, I found my recipe, and as usual gave it an Abbalicious twist.
Belgravia Gin Mixers: Gin and Pink Tonic is my favourite however I might be enjoying a cuppa tea even more than before!
For the gin and tonic layer, the original recipe called for plain tonic! Like really? Why? Instead I used a premixed gin and tonic mixer from Belgravia. I bought two: my ultimate favourite – Gin and Pink tonic (gin infused with cucumber and a hint of rose) which was to be used for the cheesecake and one that I hadn’t seen before, Gin and Tea ( gin infused with rooibos tea and honey) which I bought for tasting.
Originally I thought the gin and pink tonic would be nice and the jelly will have a gorgeous light pink colour. Only after opening the Gin and Tea (you know… baking is thirsty work!) and after having a sip, I thought no wait… this might be a far superior option. When you think of a cup of rooibos tea what normally comes to mind. Yes a lovely cup of black rooibos tea with a slice of lemon. Lemon and rooibos is what basil is to tomatoes. The rooibos tea flavour absolutely took the gin and tonic cheesecake to another level.
Gin and tonic jelly in the making... adding some extra flavour like juniper berries helps to elevate the gin.
And do you know what the best thing was when I made this cake. I could step out into my boozy garden and pick my very own fresh edible flowers and lemon thyme as decoration!! Now that is a super bonus SCORE!!
Cheesecake all done, ready to go into the fridge for the night. This is so that the flavours can infuse and jelly can set. (Fingers crossed) My biggest stress was the jelly not setting? By adding the additional alcohol to the jelly would it make it unstable preventing it from setting? Well you just have to wait and see…
Taa Daaa!!! It set!! Yes! The only thing I would suggest, is to making doubly sure that your cake tin is properly sealed. My jelly ran out a little causing a sticky mess in my fridge. I would also suggest to make sure that the cheese base is 100% set and the jelly has cooled down. As you can see in my cake there is a few specks of the cheese filling floating in the jelly.
This cake disappeared so fast, I wanted to do a nice picture of a gin and tonic with a slice of cheesecake next to it… well that didn’t happen. If you are not a sweet person this cheesecake is for you. It is more tart and zesty. Keeping a little of the lime and lemon zest in the jelly gives you a marmalade bitterness. I think I may omit the zest next time, unless you a marmalade lover you can keep it in.
You can go even bigger with this cake, you can get some fresh berries like blueberry, raspberry or strawberries, soaking them 15 minutes in the gin. When ready to serve scatter some fresh lemon thyme sprigs over the gin and tonic cheesecake and serve with the gin infused berries.
Here we go… the moment you all been waiting for. The recipe! If you are gin lover what is your favourite gin? If you tried this recipe tell us what you think. Until next time… happy eating and remember to drink responsibly.
Chow chow!! xxx
Gin and Tonic Cheesecake
Ingredients
Cheesecake Base
- 200 grams Tennis Biscuits
- 100 grams Butter Melted
Gin Cheesecake Filling
- 600 grams Creamed Cottage Cheese
- 100 grams Icing Sugar
- 1 zest and juice lime
- 50 ml gin
- 280 ml sour cream
Gin and Tonic Jelly
- 6 gelatin leaves soaked in cold water
- 1 wide strip lemon zest finely sliced
- 1 wide strip lime zest finely sliced
- 1 juice of a lime
- 0.5 juice of 1/2 lemon
- 0.5 juice of 1/2 orange
- 100 gram castor sugar
- 6 juniper berries smashed
- 275 ml Belgravia Gin and Tea Mixer
- 75 ml Gin
- 3 sprigs of lemon thyme
Instructions
Cheesecake Base:
- Butter / Spray 23cm loose-bottomed tin and line with baking parchment paper.
- Put the tennis biscuits in a food processor and blitz. Alternatively use a plastic food bag and crush to crumbs using a rolling pin.
- Transfer to a bowl, and pour the melted butter over. Mix well until all the crumbs are completely coated.
- Tip them into the prepared tin and press firmly down into the base to create an even layer. Chill in the fridge for 1 hr to set firmly.
Gin and tonic cheesecake filling
- For the filling, place the cream cheese, icing sugar and lime zest in a bowl, then beat until smooth.
- Add the gin and sour cream, and continue mixing until the mixture is thick and completely combined.
- Spoon the creamed mixture onto the biscuit base. Spread to the edges. Smoothing the
top of the cheesecake down spatula. Cover with cling-wrap and put in the fridge for 2 hours or until the filling is set.
Gin and Tonic Jelly Layer
- Add the gelatin leaves in a small bowl of cold water for 5-10 minutes to soften.
- Add the lemon, orange and lime juice along with the zest, castor sugar and smashed juniper berries in a small heavy-based saucepan.
- Very gently heat dissolving the sugar and infusing the flavours.
- Strain into a bowl reserving a few of the zest (discard the rest of the zests and berries ) and keep warm.
- Squeeze out the water from the gelatin leaves, then whisk, one by one, into the warm citrus syrup until dissolved.
- Add the gin and gin tea mixer, whisking a little by little to the jelly mixture.
- Very gently pour over the chilled cheesecake layer. Scatter over a few lemon thyme sprigs and edible flowers like violas.
- Wrap with cling wrap and put in the fridge for overnight or at least 6 hours or until the jelly is set.
**All images used in this post is my own. You can use any gin and tonic mixer. Neither Belgravia or Triple three paid or sponsored this article.
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