Skip to main content

White Chocolate Cheesecake with Rhubarb Compote

This soft and creamy cheesecake makes a suitably impressive and indulgent end to a dinner party

By bbcgoodfood · From Open Recipes · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Chocolate and rhubarb work together. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and 29 recipes mention both. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

The recipe

Serves 10 - 12
Prep20 min

Ingredients

Contains: egg, milk, wheat (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Method written by CompKitchen from the ingredient list. Not the original author's method, not kitchen-tested.

  1. Crush the oatcake biscuits finely, mix with the melted butter, and press firmly into the base of a 23cm (9-inch) springform tin. Chill while you make the filling.

  2. Scrape the seeds from the split vanilla pod into a pan. Add the rhubarb chunks, a portion of the golden caster sugar, the pod halves and the orange blossom muscat wine.

  3. Cook the rhubarb gently over low heat for about 10 minutes until just tender but still holding its shape. Remove the vanilla pod and cool the compote, then chill.

  4. Heat the oven to 160°C (325°F). Melt the white chocolate gently over a pan of simmering water or in short bursts in the microwave, then let it cool slightly.

  5. Beat the full fat soft cheese with the remaining sugar until smooth. Beat in the eggs one at a time, then the vanilla essence and the cooled melted chocolate.

  6. Whip the double cream to soft peaks and fold it gently into the cheese mixture. Pour the filling over the chilled base and smooth the top.

  7. Place the tin in a deep roasting tray, pour in boiling water to come halfway up the sides, and bake for about 1 hour until the edges are set with a slight wobble in the centre and the centre reaches 160°F (71°C).

  8. Turn off the oven, leave the cheesecake inside with the door ajar for 30 minutes, then cool completely and refrigerate overnight. Serve chilled with the rhubarb compote.

By bbcgoodfood. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Chocolate + rhubarbtop 15% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together29 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  2. Chocolate + vanillatop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together10,018 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Butter + cheesetop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together7,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Butter + creamtop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together41,494 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Vanilla + rhubarbtop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together276 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

Flavor stand-ins for the vanilla

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (biscuit, butter, chocolate, cream, cheese, egg, rhubarb):

  1. Vanillathe original
  2. Strawberryabout as good a flavor fit

Fit is the average pairing score against biscuit, butter, chocolate, cream, cheese, egg, rhubarb. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).