Fridge-set banana cheesecake

From Hummingbird bakery book

Ingredients:

6 leaves gelatine

200g peeled bananas, mashed plus extra to decorate

70ml orange juice

300g cream cheese

110g caster sugar

3 egg yolks

250ml double cream

base

200g digestive biscuits

150g unsalted butter, melted

a 23cm round springform cake tin, greased and base lined with greaseproof paper

For the base (in the place Lon-don):

Roughly break up the digestive biscuits and put them in a food processor. (If you don’t have a food processor, just do it by hand like I did, it’ll be slightly lumpy bumpy but that’s ok) Process until finely ground. Slowly pour the melted butter into the processor while the motor is running. Press the mixture into the base of the prepared cake tin, using the ball of your hand or a tablespoon to flatten and compress it (I think using fingers is best!) Refrigerate while you make the topping.

Put the gelatine leaves in a small jug of barely tepid water and soak according to manufacturer’s instructions.

(This was confusing. The supermarket didn’t have gelatine leaves so I used Dr.Oetker sachets which didn’t really correlate with the recipe so I guessed one sachet and that seemed to be ok)

Put the mashed bananas and orange juice in a saucepan and heat over medium heat until the bananas are cooked through. Set aside to cool slightly ( I squeezed the juice from one big jaffa orange)

Put the cream cheese, sugar and egg yolks in a freestanding electric mixer with a paddle attachment (I just used a hand whisk) and beat on a slow speed until you get a very smooth, thick mixture.

In a separate bowl, using a handheld electric whisk (again, I used a handheld one. Upper arms beginning to resemble that of SJP or Madonna), whip the cream until thick but not stiff.Gently fold the cream cheese mixture by hand, set aside

Take the gelatine and put it into the warm banana and orange juice mixture – Hummingbird say to make sure the mixture isn’t too hot or it will destroy the gelatine. There was no danger of that with mine, I don’t know why, it just really wasn’t that hot. Didn’t seem to make too much difference)

Stir well until all the gelatine has completely melted away and is evenly dispersed. Spoon a little of the cream cheese mixture into the banana mixture and stir to mix, then add a little more,until well combined and smooth.

Spoon the mixture onto the cold cheesecake base and leave to cool completely. Cover and refrigerate for 2 hours, or overnight if poss and decorate. I did a wee cluster of banana slices in the middle then grated some orange zest over (left over from earlier) and scattered with edible gold stars. I was given the stars as a gift earlier in the week and subsequently, they have been put in pretty much everything. Do not put them in your gin and tonic, they will turn it yellow. We learnt the hard way