How to make Nadiya Hussain’s vegan cheesecake

Wow your dinner guests with a recipe for banana dairy-free ice-cream cheesecake with blueberry compote by The Great British Bake Off winner, TV chef and presenter Nadiya Hussain

For many, cooking family favourites and baking cakes brought back some of life’s pleasures during lockdown. TV chef and winner of The Great British Bake Off in 2015 Nadiya Hussain knows this all too well — she shared more than 100 recipes in her fifth cookbook, Nadiya Bakes, which were first featured on her BBC2 TV series of the same name. Out of all those recipes, the vegan cheesecake is one of her favourites: “Cheesecake in any form is a winner for me and this is a simple no-bake ice-cream version, which also happens to be vegan. Its sweet, oaty, hazelnutty base is filled with a banana ice-cream ‘cheesecake’ layer, then topped with a warm blueberry compote.”

Nadiya’s vegan cheesecake

Serves 8-12

Takes 30 mins, plus chilling and freezing

Ingredients

For the base

• 160g porridge oats
• 160g roasted whole hazelnuts
• 60ml coconut oil, plus extra for greasing
• 185g golden syrup

For the filling

• 7 frozen bananas, about 580g, chopped
• 2 tbsp golden syrup
• ½ tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 tbsp cocoa powder

For the compote

• 250g fresh or frozen blueberries
• ½ lemon, zest and juice
• 100g caster sugar

Method

1. Grease and line the base and sides of a 20cm round loose-bottom tin, 7.5cm deep.
2. To make the base, toast the oats and hazelnuts in a large frying pan on a medium heat for about 5 mins until they just start to turn a golden brown, stirring all the time. Pop them into a food processor and blitz to a fine crumb. Add the coconut oil, golden syrup and a pinch of salt and blitz again till it all clumps together.
3. Pour the mixture into the prepared tin and, using the back of a spoon, press into the base and 2.5cm up the sides. Put the base in the fridge while you make the filling.
4. To make the filling, put the frozen chopped bananas in a food processor with the golden syrup, cinnamon and cocoa. Allow the bananas to defrost for a few mins, then blitz till you have what looks like a soft-scoop ice cream. Quickly spoon the mixture on top of the prepared base and pop into the freezer until you’re ready to eat.
5. When you’re ready to eat, make the compote by adding the blueberries, lemon zest and juice and sugar to a pan and stirring over a medium heat until the blueberries have just softened. You can make the compote well in advance and, if you do, keep it chilled in the fridge until serving.
6. Take the cheesecake out of the freezer, slide it out of the cake tin and put it on your serving dish. Add the warm compote on top and leave for a few mins before slicing and enjoying.

Recipe taken from Nadiya Bakes by Nadiya Hussain (Michael Joseph, £22).