Warm these up in the microwave and serve with some ice-cream, a delicious dessert for any occasion! Put the double cream in a bowl and whisk in the ice cream stabiliser and salt. Leave it to stand for 15 minutes and whisk to soft peaks. Add the condensed milk and stir. This is a simple and lazy dessert that can be served on its own or as an accompaniment to chocolate brownie, a gooey chocolate cake or a syruped halva even. I did have plans to make cherry chocolate brownie sundaes with them; layering them up with ice cream, whipped cream and drizzling more kirsch and cherries over the top. But I went out to work and when I came home they’d all gone, so you’ll have to use your imagination instead. The sundae sounded pretty tasty in my imagination!

Here I used Opies Foods cherries to create two accompaniments to a chocolate dessert (a gooey chocolate pie or brownie is perfect with both these).

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Hints and tips: As an alternative to using the oven, a kitchen blowtorch can be used to brown the meringue. Honestly, it was worth it. Once the chocolate on top has set, you get the crunch of the chocolate, and then the gooey delicious perfect fudgey brownie underneath. shots of the Luxardo Kirsch which the cherries had been in How to make your Chocolate Brownies with Boozy Cherries:

I obviously use the dark chocolate, but you can swap the chocolate chips that you fold through (Not the ones you melt for the batter) to milk chocolate, and the drizzle on top can also be milk chocolate, for these though I prefer dark! Return the mixture to the pan, slit the vanilla pod lengthways, remove the seeds and add to the mixture, stirring all the time. Remove from the heat, remove the pod then cover with cling film and leave to cool completely. Once chilled, beat until smooth. Depending on your ovens, or how you mixed the brownies up, some can take up to an hour to bake successfully. I’ve never fully understood why, but don’t give up if they’re not done after 40 minutes – cover with foil and continue to bake for longer. I poke a skewer through them and wait till its mostly clean, and the mixture doesn’t wobble in the tin.Whisk in half of the sugar for about a minute until there are soft peaks, gradually fold in the remaining sugar. In a saucepan, warm the liquid from the jar, squeeze the gelatine leaves to remove excess water and stir into the hot cherry liquid to dissolve. Pass the flour, cocoa powder through a fine sieve and add to the eggs and sugar. Gently whisk the ingredients together until combined. Then mix in the melted chocolate and the vegetable oil to combine. Stir through the cherries and kirsch and pour the batter into the tin. Also, you can drizzle the cheesecake with melted chocolate, cherry jam, or beaten down Cherry Filling instead of the spare Cherry Kirsch liquid if you wished! And you can easily just use Whipped Cream on top instead of the Vanilla Cheesecake but that’s up to you! When reducing the Kirsch liquid down to drizzle on the cheesecake, be careful not to over reduce as it’ll almost turn to a caramel and go solid. I reduce my liquid to about 1/4 of the original amount by letting it boil constantly for a few minutes.