Savoury Cheesecake with Roasted Heirloom Tomatoes

Serves: 8-12

Prep time: 25 minutes

Cook time: 1 hour 20 minutes

In my experience, cheesecakes are almost always a crowd pleaser with my friends and family, so when I had some people coming round for lunch recently, I decided I would make this savoury version for them. This is a great alternative to quiche and it's also a bit more robust so you can take it on a picnic with you. Despite the cooking time, don't be put off by it, most of the recipe is oven based, so you won't have to slave over the stove for this recipe!

Ingredients:

Base-

80g salted butter

75g cheese biscuits (I used gouda roka crispies for their light texture)

140g dijestives for cheese

1.5 tsp nutritional yeast

30g mixed seeds

1 tsp thyme leaves

Cheese filling -

350g full fat cream cheese

200g brie with rind cut off

250g tub of marscapone

5 eggs

Zest of 1 lemon

3 tsp dijon

1 tbsp nutritional yeast

1.5 tsp salt

1/2 tsp white pepper

A pinch of nutmeg

Tomatoes-

6 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp maldon salt

450g mixed size heirloom tomatoes

8 peeled garlic cloves

3 red wine vinegar

10 sprigs of thyme

Basil, leaves picked

Method:

1. Melt the butter in a small saucepan. Blitz the cheese biscuits and digestives to fine crumb in a food processor. Addto a large bowl along with the melted butter, seeds, thyme leaves and nutritional yeast, along with a pinch of salt.

2. Grease a deep 20cm loose bottom cake tin and line the bottom with parchment paper, so that it comes 1cm up the side of the tin. Tip the biscuit mix in and press down firmly to make a smooth base. Put this in the fridge to firm up whilst you make the filling.

3. Preheat the oven to 170C. Rinse out the food processor and add in the 3 cheeses. Blend to a smooth creamy mixture before adding the eggs one at a time, blending after each addition.

4. Add the rest of the ingredients and blend again. Carefully pour the mix over the prepared base and bake in the centre of the oven for 60 minutes, checking half way through that it's cooking evenly.

5. Allow the cake to cool in the tin and then carefully lift it out. Peel the parchment from the side and use a cake spatula to carefully slide the cake off the parchment and metal tin base and onto a serving plate or cake stand.

6. Turn the oven up to 200C. Tip the tomatoes, garlic and thyme into a small baking tray. Drizzle with oil and vinegar and sprinkle with salt. Roast in the oven for 20 minutes until the tomatoes have softened.

7. Allow the tomatoes to cool and remove them from the tray, leaving most of the roasting liquid behind. Arrange them on top of the cheesecake, along with the basil leaves and serve with a simple side salad.