Pistachio and raspberry cheesecake

Cheesecake al pistacchio e lamponi

By: Melissa Forti
From: The Italian Baker

I use Pistacchi di Bronte here, from Bronte in Sicily. These little gems explode with flavour! You can use any pistachios you happen to find, but if you get the chance to buy the Bronte variety, grab them fast.

This cheesecake says “summer” to me, and it celebrates once again all that is dear to me: my mother-country Italy, England which has adopted me, and America where I spent two important years of my life. Enjoy!

Ingredients

Quantity	Ingredient

For the crust

Quantity	Ingredient
60g	shelled pistachios
160g	digestive biscuits or graham crackers
80g	butter, melted

For the filling

Quantity	Ingredient
900g	cream cheese
270g	icing sugar, sifted
2 tablespoons	cornflour
1/2 teaspoon	salt
5	eggs
250g	sour cream
2 teaspoons	vanilla paste or extract
250g	double cream

To decorate

Quantity	Ingredient
110g	apricot jam
150g	shelled pistachios
250g	raspberries, depending how big they are

Method

Preheat the oven to 180°C. Butter the base and sides of a 23-cm springform cake tin. Wrap foil tightly all around the outside of the tin to make it watertight.
For the crust, put all the ingredients in a food processor and pulse until they resemble breadcrumbs. Press the crumbs into the bottom of the prepared tin and bake for 10–15 minutes. Remove from the oven and leave to cool completely. Leave the oven on.
For the filling, beat the cream cheese in the bowl of a stand mixer until smooth. In a separate bowl, sift together the icing sugar, cornstarch and salt, then gradually beat into the cream cheese. Add the eggs, one at the time, on low speed. Finally, beat in the sour cream, vanilla and double cream.
Pour the mixture into the tin over the baked crust. Place the tin inside a larger one and fill the larger one with hot water to come about halfway up the cheesecake tin. This is a water bath and it helps to bake the cheesecake gently and evenly. Bake for 60 minutes until the top feels firm.
Remove the tin from its water bath and peel away the foil. Leave the cheesecake to cool completely in the tin on a wire rack, then transfer to the fridge and chill for at least 4 hours, or overnight. Once chilled, run a knife around the edge of the cheesecake and release it from the tin on to a plate.
When you are ready to serve, heat the jam until runny, then strain through a sieve. Brush the jam all over the cake. In a food processor, roughly chop the pistachios. Holding the cake up with one hand, press the chopped pistachios all around the side of the cake. Cover the top with raspberries.