Simple to make but absolutely delicious - this gorgeous Chocolate Orange Cheesecake is perfect as a decadent Christmas treat!

It's also gluten free so it's great for everyone during the holiday!

Biscuit Base:

• 300g gluten-free digestive biscuits (you can also use normal digestive biscuits!)
• 150g unsalted butter

Cheesecake Filling:

• 600g full fat cream cheese 
• 300ml double cream
• 75g icing sugar
• 300g Chocolate Orange (almost 2 complete oranges)

Topping:

• 170ml double cream
• 2 tbsp icing sugar
• 12 chocolate orange segments (or more depending on the size of your slices!)

Kitchen Utensils:

• 20cm deep round baking tin (with removable bottom or springform preferable!)
• Electric whisk (if you want to save on manual whisking)
• Glass bowl/microwavable bowl
• Mixing bowl
• Measuring utensils (scales & measuring spoons)
• Wooden spoon
• Blender/Rolling pin
• Piping bag (you can also use a food/sandwich bag, simply snip off a small corner, around half a cm, spoon your mixture into the bag, twist off the top of the bag and squeeze out through the corner)

Make your biscuit base – add your biscuits into a blender and blitz until it's small crumbs, if you don’t have a blender, put your biscuits in a food bag (if they’re only thin sandwich bags, make it multiple bags!) and use the end of your rolling pin to crush the biscuits into small crumbs. Add this to your mixing bowl.

Melt your butter in a pan on a medium heat until fully melted, make sure to stir regularly to break up your butter chunks and melt it all completely.

Add your melted butter to your biscuit crumb and stir until fully combined; there shouldn’t be any dry biscuit in there! Spoon the mixture into the bottom of your baking tin and level out, lightly pressing down with your fingers or the back of a spoon to flatten out. Don’t apply too much pressure or your biscuit base may come out too hard!

Place in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour.

Make your filling – Start by adding your chocolate orange to a glass bowl and melting this over a pan of simmering (not boiling!) water, stirring frequently to help the chocolate melt. Alternatively, place your chocolate in a microwavable bowl/jug, and microwave in short bursts to melt the chocolate.

Once it’s melted allow to cool slightly on the side.

While you are waiting for your chocolate to cool, mix together your cream cheese and icing sugar in a large mixing bowl until thick and creamy. In another bowl whip up your double cream until nice and thick (you can form peaks in the cream that hold its shape) then fold this into your cream cheese mix until fully combined.

Add a third of your melted chocolate into this mix and fold to combine, then add the rest of your chocolate and again fold into the mixture until fully combined. If it’s looking a bit runny give it a blitz with your electric whisk! You’ll know it’s fully combined when it’s a lovely milk chocolate colour (no stripes of white!).

Spoon your mixture onto your chilled biscuit base making sure to level it out as you go and finish with a nice and level top. Cover with cling film and place back in the refrigerator to chill for at least 6 hours but is best overnight.

Make your topping – Whip up your double cream and icing sugar until stiff enough to be piped. Pipe 12 circles around the top to represent each slice of your cheesecake, and top each with a slice of chocolate orange.