Vegan lemon cheesecake

This week my boyfriend mentioned he desired a piece of lemon cheesecake, but we never eat anything of the kind, because of my lactose sensitivity. Then I thought of the time I was a true vegan and I was always searching the web for vegan baking recipes. I remembered among the vegan desserts the cashew cheesecake is hugely popular and decided to check out a couple of versions. In most recipes coconut cream is used, but I am not the biggest fan of the taste of coconut, so I was happy to find it could be replaced with coconut oil, which has a very delicate flavour. The recipe I used is from GoodFood, but I made some changes, because I didn't have all the ingredients on the list. In most cheesecake videos on YouTube a high speed blender is used to blend the cashews, but I only have a food processor. To make the topping of my cake as smooth as possible, I used the little chopper bowl of my immersion blender to process the cashew nuts with almond milk in two parts and afterwards I blended everything again in a big food processor, together with the remaining ingredients. I made the cake just after lunch and when my boyfriend came home in the evening we tried it... Very happy with the result, which is light and fresh! Ingredients for 1 cake Topping - 300g raw cashews, soaked for 1,5 hour - 2,5 tbsp clear honey - 1 tsp vanilla sugar - juice and zest of 2 organic lemons (I used 1,5 lemon and added one small lime, because I didn't have enough lemons), keep 1/4 of the zest for decoration - a pinch of salt - 150mL almond milk - 50g coconut oil Base - 100g almonds - 100g soaked dried figs, chopped - 30g coconut oil Grease a cake tin of 20 cm. Process the ingredients for the base in a food processor until the mixture sticks together when you press it between your fingers. Transfer the mixture to the cake tin and press with the bottom of a glass. Put in the fridge and continue with the topping. Drain the soaked cashews. If you have a high speed blender, you can put all the ingredients inside and blend them until you have a smooth cream. As I said in the introduction, I divided my cashews and the total amount of almond milk in two parts and processed them in a small chopper bowl. So my cashew were already turned into a paste when I transferred them to my bigger, but less powerful food processor. When blended with the honey, lemon juice and zest, vanilla and coconut oil, the cashew paste turns into a soft cream. Taste, add more honey or vanilla sugar if you like, and pour the cream into the cake tin. Give it a bit of a shake to make the topping spread evenly and smoothen it with a spatula. Leave in the fridge to set for 3 or more hours. When ready to serve, decorate the cake with the remaining lemon zest. It should come out of the cake tin without much effort. If you notice the cream is still quite soft, it might have to set a little bit longer. Enjoy!