Mary Berry’s heavenly lemon cheesecake on a ginger crust is a five-ingredient, no-bake dessert made with mascarpone, lemon curd and a ginger biscuit base. It chills in a 20cm (8 in) loose-bottomed tin for 4-24 hours and serves 8.
Berry first published this in Cook Up a Feast (2010) with Lucy Young. The headnote says it “was the favourite pudding at a charity buffet for 40” and “went like lightning.” It takes 10 minutes of active work, which makes it Berry’s fastest cheesecake by far.
The filling has no gelatine, no condensed milk and no eggs. Two tubs of mascarpone beaten with a jar of lemon curd and fresh lemon juice is the entire filling. Berry warns to take care not to overbeat at step 2, because too much air makes the texture grainy instead of smooth.
Mary Berry Heavenly Lemon Cheesecake
Course: DessertCuisine: BritishDifficulty: Easy8
servings10
minutes475
kcalFrom Cook Up a Feast (2010, with Lucy Young), Berry’s simplest cheesecake recipe. Tagged “Great for a crowd” because you can scale up to three batches without losing quality.
Ingredients
100g (3½ oz) ginger biscuits, crushed
50g (1¾ oz) butter, melted
2 x 250g tubs mascarpone
325g jar luxury lemon curd
juice of 1 small lemon
fresh raspberries and blueberries, to decorate
icing sugar, to dust
Directions
- Make the base: Mix the biscuits with the butter in a bowl, then press into the base of the tin (but not up the sides).
- Mix the filling: Put the mascarpone, lemon curd and lemon juice in a bowl and beat with a spatula until smooth.
- Chill: Spoon on to the biscuit base and level the top. Chill in the fridge for at least 4 hours and up to 24 hours to firm up.
- Serve: Remove the cheesecake from the tin, peel off the baking parchment and arrange on a platter. Decorate with the fruit and dust with icing sugar.
FAQs
Why does Berry say not to overbeat the mascarpone?
Mascarpone is already soft and high in fat, so it doesn’t need vigorous beating. Working it too hard whips in air bubbles that make the texture uneven and slightly grainy after chilling. Berry says to “beat with a spatula until smooth,” which means gentle folding rather than electric whisking.
I made this once with a hand whisk and the filling looked curdled after 30 seconds. A spatula or wooden spoon gives you more control. You’re blending three things together, not aerating them.
What kind of lemon curd should I use?
Berry specifies “luxury lemon curd” which means a brand with a high butter and egg content. Cheap lemon curds use cornstarch as a thickener and taste flat. The curd is doing most of the flavouring work here, so the quality matters more than in a baked recipe where other flavours compete.
Berry uses lemon curd in several desserts across her books. In her lime and lemon curd roulade, she notes to “use best-quality lemon curd for the most intense flavour.” The same logic applies here since the curd is one of only three filling ingredients.
Can I swap the ginger biscuits for digestives?
You can, but you’ll lose the pairing Berry designed. The warm spice in ginger biscuits cuts through the rich, sweet mascarpone filling. Digestives would make the whole thing taste flat by comparison. Berry chooses her base biscuits carefully and uses ginger specifically for this cheesecake.
If you don’t like ginger, try dark chocolate digestives instead. Berry lists “chocolate digestive” as one of her go-to cheesecake biscuits in the Ultimate Cake Book (2003). The slight bitterness of dark chocolate works better here than plain digestives.
How is this different from Berry’s other lemon cheesecakes?
This is Berry’s richest version. The mascarpone and lemon curd filling has roughly double the fat content of her Easy Lemon Cheesecake, which uses condensed milk and low-fat soft cheese. It also has the fewest ingredients of any cheesecake in her books: five, not counting decoration.
Berry’s Sharp Lemon Cheesecake from the same era is lighter because it folds whipped cream through a jelly-set filling. The ginger crust version trades lightness for intensity. Berry serves them at different occasions: the Sharp one for dinner parties, this one for crowds and buffets.
Why isn’t this suitable for freezing?
Berry’s prepare-ahead note says “not suitable for freezing,” which is unusual because she normally freezes everything possible. Mascarpone has a high fat and low water content, so it separates into a grainy, oily mess when frozen and thawed. The lemon curd on top of that makes things worse.
Berry’s cheesecake essay in the Ultimate Cake Book (2003) says gelatine-set cheesecakes freeze for up to a week. This one has no gelatine, so there’s nothing holding the structure together through a freeze-thaw cycle. Stick to Berry’s 1-day-ahead instruction and serve it from the fridge.
Can I make this in a larger tin for more servings?
Berry’s “great for a crowd” tip says to make multiple cheesecakes rather than one bigger one. Scaling up the filling in a larger tin means a thinner layer that won’t set as firmly. Three separate 20cm cheesecakes in a batch is her limit before the quality drops.
If you need more than 24 servings, Berry says to prepare them “in separate batches.” I’ve made two at once and the timing works fine since the active prep is only 10 minutes per cheesecake. Stack them in the fridge and they’ll all be ready by the next day.
