Recipe: Roberta Hall-McCarron’s Blackberry Cheesecake Brownie

Looking for the perfect showstopper dessert for an autumn dinner party? We’ve got just the ticket: a blackberry cheesecake brownie recipe, taken from Roberta Hall-McCarron’s new cookbook The Changing Tides. A reflection of Roberta’s hyper-seasonal ethos – which she showcases across her three Edinburgh restaurants, The Little Chartoom, Eleanore, and Ardfern, it’s divided into the four seasons, with an array of beautiful, delicious recipe ideas inspired by her childhood. 

Blackberry Cheesecake Brownie Recipe

Fudgy chocolate brownie with zingy, fresh blackberries and creamy cheesecake – heaven.

Serves 8

Ingredients:

Brownie

• 110g 70% dark chocolate, roughly chopped
• 110g unsalted butter, cubed
• 2 medium eggs
• 170g light soft brown sugar
• 1 vanilla pod or 1 tsp vanilla extract 
• 75g plain flour
• ¼ tsp salt

Blackberry cheesecake

• 500g blackberries
• 225g cream cheese
• 2 tbsp icing sugar, sifted
• 2 tbsp double cream 
• ¾ platinum gelatine leaf
• To finish: 25g white chocolate

Equipment:

20cm springform cake tin, lined with greaseproof paper 

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C fan. 
2. Make the brownie base first. In a bain-marie, melt the chocolate and butter, then set aside. In a bowl, whisk the eggs, sugar and vanilla together and then, off the heat, beat them into the chocolate mix.
3. Fold in the flour and salt, then pour the batter into the lined cake tin and bake for 20 minutes until you see cracks at the edges. Leave the brownie to cool in its tin.
4. Set aside 100g of the blackberries, then blitz the rest of them in a small blender until smooth (a stick blender will also work). Push them through a sieve to get a purée, then weigh out 225g and set aside. In a bowl, whisk the cream cheese, icing sugar and cream together until everything is combined and smooth. 
5. Bloom the gelatine in a small bowl of cold water for 5 minutes. In a small pan, warm the weighed out blackberry purée. Squeeze out any excess water from your gelatine leaf, then add the softened leaf to the purée. Stir until it has dissolved, then beat the purée into the cream cheese mix until it is fully incorporated. Quickly pour it on to the cooled brownie so you have a nice, flat layer, then put it into the fridge to set for a few hours.
6. To serve, halve the remaining blackberries and decorate the top of the cheesecake with them, then grate over plenty of white chocolate. 

Extracted from The Changing Tides, A Cookbook by Roberta Hall-McCarron (Kitchen Press, £25)