Chocolate-Lime Cheesecake
7 oz (200g) chocolate wafer cookies
1/3 cup (75g) unsalted butter
26 oz (750g) cream cheese
1 cup sugar
4 whole eggs
2 yolks
juice of 4 small limes (approx 3/4 cup)
8-inch (20-21cm) springform cake pan
Aluminum foil
Place a large overlapping piece of foil over the bottom of the springform pan, and then insert the pan ring over it. Fold the foil up around the sides of the pan and place the whole thing on a second piece of foil, also folding it and pressing it secure up around the pan so that you have a water-tight covering.
Process the cookies until they are like crumbs, then add the butter and pulse again. Line the bottom of the springform pan, pressing the cookies in with your hands or the back of a spoon. Put the pan in the refrigerator to set, and preheat the oven to 350 (180C, gas mark 4).
Beat the cream cheese gently until it’s smooth, and then add the sugar. Beat in the eggs and egg yolks, then finally the lime juice. Put a full kettle of water on.
Pour the cream cheese filling onto the chilled cookie base, place the cake pan in a roasting pan, and pour hot water from the recently boiled kettle around the foil-wrapped cheesecake to cover about halfway up the sides of the springform. Don’t overfill. Transfer it as steadily as you can to the oven and cook for 1 hour or so, checking after 50 minutes. It should feel set, but not rigidly so. You want to be able to detect, below the skin, the slightest, sexiest hint of quiver within.
Take the roasting pan out of the oven, then gingerly remove the springform for its water-filled pan. Stand it on a rack, peel off the outer layer of foil, tear away the side bits of the first layer of foil, and leave to cool. When the cheesecakes cooled down completely, place it in the refrigerator and leave it there until 20 minutes or so before you want to eat it.
Transfer to the plate you’re going to serve it on (it will need to be one without a lip, or a cake stand) and unclip. The underneath bit of the first layer of foil, along with the base of the pan, are going to have to stay in place, unless you like living really dangerously.
It makes life easier if, when you cut it, you heat the knife and cake slicer under a very hot tap first.
Serves 8