Nutella swirl cheesecake with oreo crust

Happy birthday, Chubby! My Chubby pig turned 13 today! ^^

I had planned on a chocolate cake with bailey's cream cheese frosting, but over the weekend, Chubby declared he wanted a cheesecake.

So here goes...

Nutella swirl cheesecake with oreo crust (recipe adapted from donal skehan, anncoo journal, bakericious and here)
~ fits a 9-inch square tin
160g oreos, crushed
80g unsalted butter, melted

500g cream cheese
60g sugar
3 egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla extract
200ml sour cream
3 egg whites
60g sugar
25g corn flour, sifted
6-7 tbsps nutella, add to taste (+ 1 tbsp cream, optional)

Nutella fudge sauce, optional
3-4 tbsps nutella, add to taste
3-4 tbsps milk or cream

1. Mix crushed oreos and melted butter together. Press crushed cookies evenly into a lined baking tin, till nice and firm. Bake in a preheated oven of 160C for 10-15 minutes. Remove and leave to cool. If lazy, omit the baking part and just stuff the crust into the fridge and chill for a bit..

2. In a mixing bowl, beat cream cheese till light and fluffy. Then add sugar till well blended.

3. Gently mix in the egg yolks one at a time till well mixed. Next add the vanilla extract.

4. Fold in the sour cream into the cheese batter.

5. In a clean bowl, beat egg whites till foamy, and add the sugar bit by bit. Beat till soft peaks form (no need to beat till stiff unlike for chiffon cake). Gently fold in sifted corn flour.

6. Mix 1/3 egg whites mixture into cheese batter till well combined. Fold the rest in gently.

7. Remove 1/3 cake batter and mix with nutella (+ a tbsp milk/cream) till well blended.

8. To prepare cake, place some plain batter into the baking tin, followed by placing dollops of nutella batter all over. Next dollop on some plain batter, followed by the rest of the nutella batter. Top/end with dollops of plain batter.

9. Using a chopstick/skewer, make zig-zag motions across the batter. Turn the baking tin 90degrees, and do the same again.

10. Bake in a preheated oven of 160C (or 150C if oven is too hot) for 50-55 minutes (the center should still be a wee bit jiggly ^^). Leave to cool in the oven with the door slightly ajar for about 1 hour. Chill in the fridge overnight before serving.

11. If planning to serve with nutella fudge sauce, place nutella and cream/milk in a heatproof bowl over a pot of simmering water. Whisk nutella gently till melted, and drizzle over cake before serving.

As piggies always want "more! more! more!", I had "very generously" drizzled nutella fudge sauce all over, making it look quite a sight! Chubby actually said it looks awful, haha.. but he also said it'll most certainly taste good ! ^^ I think it's such a waste to hide the pretty swirls.. but with kids, you know you have to have sauce to make the cake sublime! ^^ ^^ ^^

As this is a big recipe, I sliced off a 6x6-inch cake for Chubby (that's Chubby's cake in the pic above, prior to it being smothered in sauce! ^^), and shared the rest.. And that's how I can tell you, this cheesecake's heavenly! ^^