Rum and Orange cheesecake

Pictures, then recipe, then details

The recipe

Base:
1 packet of biscuits (250g)
125g of butter

Cheesecake:
500g of cream cheese
3 eggs (70g each) (2 of mine had double yolks – I think you could extend this to 4 eggs if you wanted)
200g sugar
2 tbsp rum
1 tbsp flour
2 tsp of vanilla extract
1 tbsp grated orange rind (about the rind of 1 orange. You could definately increase this to 2 if you wanted)

Topping: (feel free to halve as it made about double the amount needed – however the topping will work lovely over icecream etc)
2 cups of sugar
1/2 cup of water
2tbsp rum (this is really strong – do not increase)
2tbsp of orange juice (only adds a subtle flavour difference)
200ml of creme
1 1/2 tsp of gelatin (would use 2 – 2 1/2 next time – you could skip the gelatin but the sauce would be runnier)

Instructions:
Base:
1. Crush the biscuits into crumbs
2. Mix with butter
3. Line the bottom of a 24inch spring loaded pan with baking paper. (you could use a 20inch and make a taller cake)
4. line the bottom and edge of the tin with the biscuit and butter mixture.

5. Preheat the oven to 150deg

Cheesecake:
6. In a large bowl cream the cream cheese and sugar together
7.  Beat the eggs in one at a time
8. Stir in the vanilla, rum and orange peel
9. Stir in the flour
10. Pour the mixture into the cake tin over the biscuits
11. Bake for 50min – 1 hour (I did 55 but think it could have done with another 5 min – it will depend on your oven)
12. Turn off the oven and leave the oven door open to let the cheesecake cool. Then pull the cake out of the oven and let sit on the bench till really cool. Feel free to refrigerate after this step.

The topping:
13. Caramalise the sugar and water
14. Remove off the stove once caramalised
15. Add cream and stir through – It will bubble/hiss etc
16. Put back on the stove at low heat and stir until the cream is all the way through and nice and smooth
17. Remove off the heat and whip in the rum, orange juice and gelatin (you could disolve the gelatin beforehand but it is hot enough that it just mixes straight in)
18. Let the topping cool
19. Spoon the topping over the cake. (Don’t pour it as it will crater the cheese cake – yes I talk from experience)
20. Put it all in the fridge to cool overnight

I swirled cream once the topping started to set on the cake, be creative in how you want to decorate or just let the caramel topping show itself off.

Enjoy

The story

I’m now catching the train to work and this has proved difficult to bring left over cake into the office (especially if they are layered and tall). I had threatened if I couldn’t find a nice tall cake carrier there may be no more cake and this week work provided me with a nice lovely large carrier. Very cool!

Today was my boss’s birthday and he likes rum cake (actually rum anything 😉 ). Normally we get cheesecake shop cake but our options for cake in the new office are pretty limited so I was asked if I had the time could I make the cake for today. Anna discovered rum and orange was nice at our Christmas party and suggested it as the flavour for the cake.

I searched for a recipe or something even similar but couldn’t find one. So I made it up with a whole range of ideas from different recipes and my growing knowledge of how everything goes together. I’m really happy with how it turned out and it received many praises from my workmates.