Summer puddings are a doddle: ripe peaches torn aside and dropped into glasses of chilled muscat; strawberries, halved and tossed with passionfruit juice; melon sprinkled with mint-infused sugar. However the prepare dinner in me needs to slice and stir and bake, to really feel the rhythm of a relaxed however busy kitchen even on a heat summer time day, which is why there was each cake and a do-it-yourself fruit ice on the desk this week: a sticky, evenly spiced cake with summer time fruits – apricots sautéed with butter and honey; and a frozen dessert of yoghurt and summer time berries.
The cake was a basic gingerbread with out the treacle notes of darkish muscovado and molasses, delivered to the desk with vanilla custard. For these whose curiosity runs to one thing tart and refreshing, there's a frozen yoghurt the color of a standard summer time pudding.
And that basic recipe, with its layer of berries and juice-soaked bread will likely be round this yr as standard, however the combination of redcurrants, blackcurrants and raspberries can even be in a bowl for breakfast, used to flavour ice-cream and stirred into meringue and cream as a bells-and-whistles dessert. Any further juice left over is superb in a glass of prosecco – a scarlet-hued mimosa.
The strawberries have been distinctive this yr. I served them tossed in a sauce of crushed raspberries with a splash of framboise. (Observe to self, I want extra miniatures of liqueurs for such events.) I cannot prepare dinner a strawberry, however they're dazzling on a crème patisserie-filled tart and higher nonetheless in a pastry case crammed with a combination of strained yoghurt, icing sugar with the merest shake of orange flower water.
Raspberries not often profit from the meddling of a prepare dinner, however this week I used them, crushed and stirred right into a bowl of stewed apple, because the filling for a fruit tart. The floor was topped with extra berries, organized very neatly.
Sticky apricot, honey and ginger cake
Very a lot a dessert fairly than tea-time cake, it is a deal with minimize into rounds fairly than slices and served in a dish with chilled custard and heat apricots. Serves 12
For the apricots:
apricots 500g, stoned and halved
honey 1 tbsp
butter 50g
For the cake:
self-raising flour 250g
floor ginger 2 stage tsp
combined spice ½ tsp
floor cinnamon ½ tsp
bicarbonate of soda 1 tsp
salt a pinch
lemon zest of 1
honey 200ml
butter 125g
mild muscovado 125g
eggs 2, massive
milk 240ml
To serve:
chilled custard 500ml
You will want a sq. cake tin measuring about 22cm, lined with baking parchment.
Halve and stone the apricots. Heat the butter in a shallow, nonstick pan, then add the fruit and go away to prepare dinner for 7-10 minutes over a low to reasonable warmth, till gentle. In the direction of the tip of their cooking time, add the spoonful of honey. Take away from the warmth and put aside.
Set the oven at 180C/fuel mark 4. Sift the flour with the bottom ginger, combined spice, cinnamon, bicarbonate of soda and salt. Add the lemon zest. Pour the honey right into a small saucepan, add the butter and the sugar and heat over a reasonable warmth till the butter has melted. When the combination has simmered for a minute take away from the warmth.
Break the eggs right into a bowl, add the milk and beat evenly to mix. Pour the butter and honey combination into the flour and spices and stir gently till no flour is seen. Combine within the milk and eggs.
Fold in half of the cooked apricots and scrape the combination into the lined cake tin. The apricots ought to slide to the underside. Put the cake within the oven and bake for 35-40 minutes, till spongy to the contact. Go away to chill within the tin.
Take away the cake from its tin and peel again the parchment. Simply earlier than serving, heat the reserved apricots in a small pan and minimize the cake into 16 equal items. Place two items on every serving dish and among the reserved apricots. Serve with cream or totally chilled custard.
Summer time fruit frozen yoghurt
Use recent blackcurrants in season, however this additionally works very effectively with frozen.
blackcurrants 125g
raspberries 200g
water 50ml
icing sugar 5 tbsp
pure yoghurt 500g
Take away the blackcurrants from their stems and put them in a small pan with the raspberries and water. Deliver to the boil, then decrease the warmth and go away to simmer for five minutes or so till the fruit has burst and the juices are effervescent. Take away from the warmth and go away to chill.
Beat the icing sugar into the yoghurt, then stir within the chilly fruits and their juice. Pour into an ice-cream machine and churn till nearly frozen. Switch to a calming container and retailer within the freezer.
To make the ice-cream with no machine, combine collectively the sweetened yoghurt and chilled fruits and stir totally. Switch to a coated plastic storage field and place within the freezer for two hours. Take away the lid and stir to combine the frozen edges into the center, then return to the freezer for an hour. Repeat this a number of occasions until the combination is sort of frozen.
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