The Paris baker: honey & walnut cheesecake

The other day I was given a simple, sweet ending to a meal: some wonderful ricotta cheese, honey and walnut cake. And so my thoughts drifted to the possibility of making a honey cheesecake with walnuts.

Honey & walnut cheesecake

Scroll down for method and ingredients

The transformation of the classic lemon cheesecake into a honeyed one was easier than I thought. Be careful with your choice of honey, as a strong heather one, for example, might overpower the whole thing. Choose a milder flower honey instead.

Rose Carrarini is co-owner of Rose Bakery in Paris and author of ‘How to Boil an Egg’ (Phaidon, £22.95)

Honey & walnut cheesecake

Method

1. Butter a 21cm-23cm springform tin. Line the base with paper if you wish. Melt the butter. Process the biscuits with the walnuts until finely chopped, then mix in the butter. Press this into the base of the tin and chill.
2. Put the cheeses, sugar and honey in the bowl of a mixer and start beating together. Add the eggs one by one and beat till smooth. Pour this mixture into the tin and bake at 180C for about 50 minutes or until just set. Take out of the oven and let cool for about 15 minutes.
3. Stir the sour cream (or crème fraîche) with the honey and vanilla and spoon this over the cooled cake, starting at the outer rim and working to the centre. You can smooth the mixture with a palette knife but this is not really necessary as it settles naturally in the oven. Cook for a further 10 minutes. Take out of the oven and cool completely before unmoulding. It is best kept in the fridge overnight.