Regular readers of my little blog will know that I’m not a huge fan of cooking, but as we’d planned to make our own New Year’s Eve feast, Phil and I wanted a homemade pudding from scratch. Phil received the Lucy Bee Coconut oil cookbook for Christmas and we saw a delicious looking raw chocolate cheesecake recipe and decided to give it a try.

The great thing about this cookbook is not only that it’s full of healthy recipes, but all the recipes are clearly labeled as to whether they are gluten free, wheat free, dairy free, lactose free, vegetarian or vegan. Lots of the non-vegan recipes can be veganised so it’s well worth getting if you’re interested in cooking with coconut oil more. There are also a few beauty recipes so you can make your body scrub, among other things.

The recipe is easy and straightforward to follow. The only difficulty I had was blitzing the cashew nuts after soaking because I don’t have a food processor but we managed to create a cashew butter, even it meant sacrificing my hand blender! Once you’ve made the cheesecake, you have to put it in the freezer, which is easy enough. The recipe says you need to take it out of the freezer for 10 minutes before serving, but I found this wasn’t long enough by any stretch. We found it needed to be out of the freezer for a good hour before it was defrosted enough to cut and then it needed a little bit longer before we could eat it. Instead of serving it with creme fraiche, we used Oatly cream, which I received in my Archie Browns hamper. It’s so good. You wouldn’t notice the difference between it and regular cream. The cheesecake keeps well, and we’ve still got a few slices left. As it’s full of natural goodness, even if you’re detoxing, you can allow yourself this!