Christmas Treats Part III: Eggnog Cheesecake with Rum Sauce

Christmas has a way of making me do funny things.

For starters, i abhor shopping. The whole act of flirting from store to store, skimming the shelves, waiting for something to catch my fancy, pfft. It just bores me out of my mind. Somehow, inspite of my aversion to the activity, of all times of the year, I found myself jostling the crowds on Christmas eve, looking for last minute gifts that had conveniently slipped my mind.

Now, i dislike eggnog, to say the least. After having one gulp the real stuff years ago, i decided it was very much an acquired taste, one that i was more than happy not to get acquired to. But somehow, year after year, i find myself making desserts that recreate the taste of eggnog each Christmas.

In this particular case, it was two things i’m not a fan of- cheesecake (other than my mum’s which i would happily eat right out of the pan all by myself) and eggnog. But i figured, in the spirit of Christmas, who cares what i like- i’m not gonna be the one eating it, especially since it was for a Christmas house party we were attending.

This recipe differed slightly from quite a few other cheesecake recipes i’ve seen. For one, the cheesecake was baked without a waterbath which had me a little worried that it would split while baking and there was a second layer on top of the cheesecake- a smooth, rich, slightly tangy layer. Thank goodness the cake didn’t split while baking or cooling and arrived looking almost picture perfect at the party.

I must admit, at this point, that i served the cake with a little apprehension. Trying out new recipes for parties and birthday cakes are nothing new to me- it would probably help if i were a little more risk averse but it has worked out pretty well so far- but serving a cake i had absolutely no idea what it would taste like (although it smelled incredibly while baking and how wrong can you go with both rum in the cake and rum sauce on the side) was certainly something new.

Thankfully, my taste tester (also known as the birthday boy in this post) who had the honourary first slice gave it the thumbs up, as did my brother which is quite a rarity in itself.

It looks like this will hardly be the last eggnog dessert i’ll be making when Christmas next year rolls around.

Eggnog Cheesecake with Rum Sauce [adapted from delicious Dec '06/ Jan '07 issue]

Ingredients
200g disgestive biscuits
2 tsp ground cinnamon †
100g unsalted butter, melted
500g cream cheese, at room temperature
1 cup + 2 tbsp caster sugar
3 eggs, at room temperature
300ml thickened cream, at room temperature
2 tbsp dark rum
1 tsp ground nutmeg
1 tsp ground cloves
2 cups sour cream ††
1 tsp vanilla extract

Rum Sauce
1 1/2 cups light brown sugar
1 cinnamon quill
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/3 cup water
1 cup thin cream
1/4 cup dark rum
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp cornstarch, dissolved in a bit of water †††

1. Preheat the oven to 170C. Line the base of a 8″ springform round cake pan with aluminium foil, grease the entire pan and set aside.
2. Put the digestive biscuits and 1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon in a huge Ziplock bag. Using a rolling pin, smash the biscuits till crumbled. Pour the crumbs into the prepared pan. Pour the melted butter in and mix the butter into the crumbs until the mixture looks like wet side. Press the mixture into the base of the pan firmly with the base of a cup and put the pan into the fridge until ready to use.
3. Beat the cream cheese and 1 cup of caster sugar with an electric mixer till smooth. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the thickened cream, rum, groud cloves, nutmeg and the rest of the cinnamon and beat till well combined. Pour the batter over the biscuit base and bake in the centre of the oven for 40 minutes. The cake should be set around the edges but still jiggly in the centre.
4. While the cake is baking, whisk the sour cream, vanilla and rest of the caster sugar together. Pour the mixture over the top of the baked cheesecake and bake it for another 10 minutes. The top layer should look set. Turn the oven off and let the cheesecake to cool in the oven for 1 hour. Remove from the oven and let cool completely at room temperature. Cover the pan with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.
5. To make rum sauce Combine the brown sugar, cinnamon, vanilla extract and water in a saucepan. Stir over low heat till the sugar dissolves. Increasing the heat to medium-high, cook the sauce till light brown, stirring occasionally. Remove the pan from heat and add the cream, rum, lemon juice and corn starch mixture, stirring to combine. Return to heat and simmer for 5 minutes till slightly thickened. Set aside to cool and serve slices of the eggnog cheesecake with it.

† The orginal recipe called for 1 1/2 tsp cinnamon with 1 tsp added to the biscuit base and the rest added to the batter. I put the entire quantity into the biscuit base by mistake and still added 1/2 tsp of the spice into the batter. It worked out fine.
†† I used 2 tubs of 200ml sour cream and made up the rest of the quantity with thin cream so i wouldn’t have extra sour cream lying around.
††† I added a bit of cornstarch to thickened the sauce as it was more like a syrup than a sauce. It thickens slightly more upon sitting in the fridge.