Chocolate Amaretto Cheesecake

Italian cuisine

Crust ingredients:
- 1 ¾ cups (240 g) chocolate wafers.
- 5 tbsp (2 ½ 0z) butter, melted.
- ¼ cup almonds ground.

Cheesecake ingredients:
- 24 oz cream cheese, room temperature.
- 1 cup (210 g) sugar.
- 3 large eggs.
- 1 cup (8 oz) heavy cream.
- 3 tbsp Amaretto.
- 7 oz semi sweet chocolate.

Directions:
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (180C).
- Begin to boil a large pot of water for the water bath.
- Mix together the crust ingredients and press into your preferred pan.
- You can press the crust just into the bottom, or up the sides of the pan too, baker’s choice. Set crust aside.
- Crushed Chocolate Wafers, almonds and butter.
- Combine cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer and cream together until smooth.
- Add eggs, one at a time, fully incorporating each before adding the next.
- Make sure to scrape down the bowl in between each egg.
- Add heavy cream, amaretto and blend until smooth and creamy.
- Pour batter into prepared crust and tap the pan on the counter a few times to bring all air bubbles to the surface.
- Place pan into a larger pan and pour boiling water into the larger pan until halfway up the side of the cheesecake pan.
- If cheesecake pan is not airtight, cover bottom securely with foil before adding water.
- chopped the chocolate well and then melted it in the microwave for 1 minute.
- Stir the chocolate and check for lumps.
- Melt further in 15 sec or 30 sec intervals only if there are lumps. Keep stirring after every heating.
- Removed 3 cups of the batter separately and then added the melted chocolate to the rest of the batter.
- Mixed with a light hand so as to not over mix.
- On top of chocolate wafer crust goes chocolate layer and then sieved very finely ground almonds on top of it.
- Bake 45 to 55 minutes, until it is almost done.
- Turn the heat off, and let rest in the cooling oven for one hour. This lets the cake finish cooking and cool down gently enough.
- Remove cheesecake from oven and lift carefully out of water bath.
- Let it finish cooling, then cover and put in the fridge to chill and chill overnight before it is served.