Great British Bake Off Challenge - Week 4; Baked Cheesecake

Oh dear, it had to happen at least once in this challenge, didn't it? I had a total fail. An absolute flop. If I had been in The Tent, it  may have ended up being another Bin-Gate style scandal (Cheesecake-Gate doesn't have the same ring to it, thankfully). It was so bad it went almost straight in the bin. Dessert week got me, and it got me good. Not wanting to make crème brûlées and not really knowing what a Spanischer Windtorte was, I decided to tackle baked cheesecake. I'm not a particular fan of baked cheesecake so I've never attempted one before and well... I probably won't attempt one again any time soon. 

I had grand ideas for this; what about a chocolate and honeycomb baked cheesecake with a dark chocolate biscuit base and honeycomb crushed over the top? It'd surely look and taste amazing. Rich, creamy dark chocolate cheesecake and crackly, golden homemade honeycomb running through it. Yum. A true showstopper! 

The best laid plans eh?

That being said, I don't think it was the recipe that was the problem. It was me. I overworked the mixture, and then cooked it totally inappropriately. I ended up with this rather sad mess:

Oooph. I can hear Sue softly weeping in the background. I can feel Paul's glare. Mary would have a small heart attack trying to summon up something nice to say about this monstrosity.

Poor, poor cheesecake. I couldn't do much other than put it out of it's misery... by putting it in the bin. I did try a bit (for science!) and it made me feel thoroughly sick.

Yes, that base is burnt. The sides are burnt. The top is burnt with shards of honeycomb melted into it (apparently if you sprinkle honeycomb on top of something that's going to bake for 45 minutes it'll melt and then harden, because you know, high sugar content). The middle is strangely under AND overcooked. The honeycomb has dissolved from the mixture to nothing. It's sunk in the middle and become dense and uh, chewy. The honeycomb that I made largely stuck to the pan and ended up being abandoned until two days later when it had become a soft sticky mess.

No recipe this week because who the frick would want to recreate that mess?! Maybe I overworked the mix (I definitely overworked the mix). Maybe I had the temperature on the wrong setting (180 - would 160 have been better for my fan oven?). Maybe I set it too close to the bottom of the oven. Should I have used Tamal's bain marie method? Maybe, Should I have just eaten the chilled base and not bothered adding the mixture? I'm inclined to say yes.

Whilst I lick my wounds, I'll be sticking to chilled cheesecakes for a little while I think. Though things may take another turn for the worse as I attempt to tackle polenta cake for Week 5 - Alternative Ingredients week...

Twelve Days of Nailmas: Day 1

Hello all!

My little finger has finally grown long enough to paint so I am back on the polish wagon! Today's post is bought courtesy of the 'Twelve Days of Nailmas' challenge facebook group. Today is day 1, and I will (hopefully!) be posting a different nail look according to our nail version of The Twelve Days of Christmas from now up until Christmas eve roughly every other day.

Here's the full song if you want to join in:

Twelve Dots a Dotting

Eleven Copper Stripes

Ten Glitters Matted

Nine Glass Flecks Gleaming

Eight Presents Prancing

Seven Reds A Fading

Six Blues A Spotting

Five Gold Rings 

Four Gradients 

Three Silver French

Two Accent Nails

And

A Polish That Looks Like Berries.

So here is my polish that looks like berries! I am in love with this design, and will probably wear it again over the festive period! I twisted the rhyme slightly and went for holly decorated accent nails. 

Messy pre-clean up photo!

Base coat - Barry M 289 'Gold', Berries - No. 17 'Ruby Glitter', Leaves - Revlon Matt Suede 933 'Emerald City'. I did two coats of Barry M, then dotted the berries and leaves on top.