Easy Peasy Speculoos No-Bake Cheesecake Recipe

Happy Boxing Day you lovely lot! Fingers crossed you had a somewhat enjoyable Christmas day, and I hope at least some of you woke up with a stinking hangover but a big smile on your face like I did. Admittedly our day was almost a disaster when I forgot to serve up the pigs-in-blankets, but fortunately I remembered them whilst we were all still eating and they hadn't turned to charcoal in the process. 

Of course every family have their own traditions, and in the (almost) 9 years that Bert and I have been together we've formed our own little rituals: there's the Christmas Eve PJs (passed down from my family), the no presents until after lunch rule (his family -that one took some getting used to) and the homemade Christmas cheesecake (my own tradition). For the past 6-7 years I've religiously made said cheesecake on Christmas Eve as an alternative to the Christmas pud, and every year it changes, but it always ticks two boxes: very chocolatey & very boozy. 

Poor Bert isn't the biggest chocoholic (hence why we're such a good team, he never raids my chocolate stash) and is tee-total.  He also hates Xmas pud, but has obligingly munched his way through years of cheesecakes including white chocolate & Baileys, dark chocolate & Cointreau and milk chocolate & Amaretto. This year though I decided to make a cheesecake based on what he loves (especially after the Mince Pie Danish debacle) so opted for a Biscoff inspired cheesecake. I popped a pic of it up on Christmas Day and received so many requests for the extremely simple recipe that I thought I'd make a change from my normal review posts to pop it up... 

N.B I can't take credit for this recipe as it's a very slight amendment from Jane's Pattiserie's, which can be found here.

Makes 8 individual Gu ramekins- but can be easily amended to suit.

Ingredients: 

Biscuit Base

•  110g Digestive Biscuits
•  110g Lotus Caramelised Biscuits
•  110g Butter

Cheesecake Filling

• 360g Philadelphia Cream Cheese
• 2 tsp Caramel flavouring (I used Dr Oetker's)
• 70g Icing sugar
•  200ml Double Cream
• 190g Crunchy Biscoff Spread/ Favorina Spiced Biscuit Spread

To Decorate

• Lotus Caramelised Biscuits

Method

1. Melt the butter in the microwave (10-20 secs should do it)
2. Blitz the biscuits into fine crumbs using a blender/food processor, and mix in the melted butter. Press into 8 ramekins.
3. Whip together the cream cheese, caramel flavouring, icing sugar and Biscoff until smooth using an electric whisk.
4. Add the cream and whisk slowly until thick enough to stay on an upturned spoon. 
5. Spread the mixture over the bases and chill in the fridge until you can't resist their call!
6. When serving, pop 1/2 a Lotus biscuit on top

Et voila! Simples... 

NEW! Specially Selected Mince Pie Ice Cream (ALDI)

This Mince Pie ice cream has been giving me the run around for weeks now. I kept seeing it pop up on instagram, but my local ALDI (which is a bit of a pain to get to from my house) has been pretty rubbish at maintaining stock of their new Christmas lines (such as their flavoured mince pies). On my third attempt, I finally got lucky, and decided to pick up both of their new festive ice creams. The other flavour -Gingerbread FYI- was reviewed yesterday by One Treat, and she gave it such high praises that I couldn't wait to get stuck in. The 480ml Christmassy Ice Cream Tubs cost £1.99 each, which isn't too bad considering Sainsbury's charge £2.85 for theirs. 

"Cream ice cream with brandy flavoured sauce, fruit conserve with brandy and biscuit pieces."

In my desperate attempt to get hold of this ice cream, I cycled across Hereford with my insulated lunch bag complete with freezer block -this was before I did the ASDA shop and was collected by my fiance. I'm explaining this because it was about 90 minutes between purchase and getting home. By the time I retrieved the ice cream from my lunch bag, the ice cream container gave slightly, and I worried that I'd ruined it. 

Opening it up a few hours later didn't seem to have damaged it in the slightest however, and I was met with a creamy coloured, easily scoopable ice cream. It wasn't as ridiculously soft as the Pizza Express Tiramisu Gelato or the likes of Carte D'Or, but my scoop gathered ice cream effortlessly, revealing some biscuit pieces and a few stray raisins. 

Just as One Treat found with the gingerbread version, the ice cream didn't melt instantly, and behaved itself long enough to survive being scooped into a waffle cone, then being photographed, before finally being enjoyed. The taste was that of super cold double cream (unsurprising considering double cream accounts for 20% of the ingredients) and it reminded me of the no-churn style ice creams that I've made in the past. A lovely warmth came from the Brandy sauce, which was eminent throughout, but occasionally popped up in stronger pockets. 

Now I've moaned before about companies giving the impression that their ice cream contains pastry *ahem Apple Tarte* when in fact they contain biscuit pieces, but I didn't even realise that this tub was devoid of real pastry until I read the description to write this post. The little chunks were certainly very sweet shortcrust pastry like, and my only query during consumption was how ALDI had managed to keep them so crispy -although I'm still baffled by this as surely biscuits should go soft when embedded in ice cream? 

My only real moan is regarding the lack of fruit pieces, after all the mince filling should be the pies raison d'être. Apparently 10% of the ice cream is the 'fruit conserve with brandy' but only 36% of that is made up of actual fruit pieces. I enjoyed the soft, plump, alcohol infused raisins and sultanas that I did find -but wasn't keen on the single hard piece of citrus peel I found in my 1/3 tub serving! 

Still, moans aside, I really enjoyed this festive ice cream from ALDI -and no I haven't got completely sick of the mince pies yet...

8/10