Raspberry, Banana and Coconut Raw Cheesecake

A healthy, raw cheesecake made with cashews, banana and raspberries

To celebrate National Nut Day I made this delicious cheesecake. I’m actually lying when I say it’s a cheesecake – this dessert contains no cream cheese at all.  This dessert really embraces the power of nuts.  The filling is actually made with cashew nuts, making it a source of zinc, iron, potassium and magnesium, and not to mention super tasty.   The base is made with almonds, walnuts and dates – again making it a great source of nutrients.    It’s not a recipe you can make in a day as you need to soak the nuts and leave to set overnight, but it’s well worth the waiting time.

While this cheesecake is nutrient packed, it’s also super rich and pretty dense in calories – so don’t go overboard!  One slice is delicious and amazingly satisfying.

It’s gluten free and dairy free too.  I was inspired by this recipe.

Here’s what you’ll need:

Base:

1 cup walnuts
1 cup almonds
1/2 cup dates (soak in hot water for 10 minutes before using)
2 tablespoons cocoa
1/4 cup coconut
2 tablespoons coconut oil, melted

Filling:

2 cups cashews, soaked for at least 3 hours, or preferably overnight in water
2 bananas
2/3 cup melted coconut oil
1/4 cup coconut cream
1 tbsp melted cacao butter (helps it set hard – but if you don’t have any, just leave it out)
1/2 cup honey
1/2 cup lemon juice
2 teaspoons vanilla essence
2 cups raspberries

 For the base:
Blend the nuts in a food processor until fine.  It doesn’t matter if there are some chunky bits as these make the base have a yummy crunchy texture.  Add the remaining ingredients and blend until the mixture sticks together well when squished.

Press into a 9 inch spring form tin.  (If you want a higher cake, use a smaller tin)

For the filling:

Pop all ingredients  except the raspberries in the food processor and blend until you get a silky smooth mixture.  You’ll need to stop the food processor and scrape the mixture down from the sides a few times to get the mixture just right.  Set aside half the mixture from the food processor into a separate bowl, then add the berries to the food processor and blend again.

Now for the fun part!

To make the pretty colour swirl, add one big spoonful of the banana/cashew mixture in to the base, then a scoop of the raspberry mixture on top.  Keep doing this until all the mixture is used up and in the tin.

Pop in the fridge to set overnight (or if you’re impatient like me – the freezer!)  It should be ready in about 5-6 hours in the freezer.

Enjoy!