Plum and Peach Crisp

I find the monsoon weather a little puzzling. The moment I think that the heat is really oppressing and I need to make a dessert that is served cold, the weather takes a turn, there is a storm and I find myself wistfully thinking of something that is warm and comforting. In this season that has its own twists and turns, I thought of the apple pear crisp I had made a while ago and how it could be served both hot and cold. It could be eaten warm, out of the oven or even chilled the next day! Ah! Now that had so many possibilities. I remembered the lovely stone fruits that we get this season and thought I would replicate that using my favourite fruits – peaches and plums. Really, there is nothing in the world that beats a delicious crisp with a crumbly crust, and some fragrant fruit paired with a dollop of vanilla ice cream. 

I do not like my crisps and crumbles to be too sweet so I drastically cut down on the sugar. As the plums are quite tangy, I used less sugar and allowed the vanilla ice cream to provide the sweet edge. If you do not intend to serve this with ice cream, I suggest doubling the quantity of sugar with the fruit.

I made a really thick topping as I like a deep crust. You can use half the crust mix to line the bottom of the pan, put in the filling and use the remaining half of the crust as a topping.

I also like the fruit to retain its shape and texture and thus, I keep my baking time to a minimum – just enough so that the topping gets nice and golden and the fruit juices start bubbling along the sides of the dish.

Feel free to swap the fruits – mango and bananas would be a great combination as well!

Plum and Peach Crisp

Inspired by Dorie Greenspan

Serves 6 – 8

Ingredients:

For the filling:

4 medium size peaches, peeled and chopped

8 plums, peeled and chopped

½ cup sugar

1 tsp vanilla essence

1 tbsp flour

For the topping:

1 cup flour

1 cup brown sugar

¾ cup oats

A large pinch of cinnamon

A large pinch of ground cloves

115 gms/ 8 tbsp of butter (if using unsalted butter, add a pinch of salt)

Method:

1.       Preheat the oven to 350C or 180F.

2.       To make the crisp, add all the ingredients except the butter in a large bowl and sift it with your fingers to blend them. Melt the butter and add it to the mix. Use your hands to moisten all the ingredients thoroughly.

3.       For the filling, toss all the ingredients together.

4.       Pour the filling into a 8 inch baking dish. Scatter the crisp topping over the filling evenly.

5.       Slide the pan in the oven and bake for 30 – 35 minutes or until the topping is golden and the fruit juices are bubbling up all around the edges.

6.       Let it cool and serve warm or at room temperature with vanilla ice cream.

Kinnow Orange Cinnamon Cake

What is it about Sunday afternoons that makes them so magical? Is it that on cold winter days you can lie on the couch with a comforter and take a nap? Or it is that perfect time of the day after you have had a heavy Sunday brunch and its not yet evening so you don’t have to think about work on Monday? Oh, you have felt it too? I knew I was in good company. 

If you like Sunday afternoons as much as I do, you will find that you love this cake. And that it will not be too much effort for you to make this on a Saturday so you can eat it on Sunday. I must confess that I made this cake only to use up some ingredients I had in the refrigerator. I’m so glad I was not too lazy and did make it. This cake will provide oomph to your Sunday. Have it at tea time with a cup of cocoa and I promise that your Monday morning blues will just vanish into thin air.

So what do you do when you try to bake a cake using only the ingredients that are there at home without a trip to the market? This was quite a new experience for me. I changed around the recipe so much that I was quite expecting that the cake wouldn’t rise at all. I was pleasantly surprised to see that it rose, looked very pretty and gave off a very fresh fragrance. I say fragrance because I could use the smell as a perfume. I really could. The sweet cinnamon offsets the citrus of the orange and this results in a clean bright scent.

Don’t wait. Make it today with the largest juiciest oranges as packed with flavor as you can find.

Kinnow Orange Cinnamon Cake

Adapted loosely from Bon Appetempt

Serves 8 – 10

Oranges and glaze

3 really large kinnow oranges

Juice of 1 lime

1 cup sugar

1/4^th teaspoon salt

Cake

115 gms/ 8 tablespoons butter

¾ th cup sugar

2 teaspoons cinnamon powder

3 eggs, at room temperature

1 cup flour

1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp orange / vanilla essence

Preheat the oven to 375 F or 190 C. Grease and dust a 9 inch light colored aluminum round pan.

Grate the zest of an orange and reserve it for the cake. Juice it – you should have ½ cup of orange juice. Slice the remaining 2 oranges (along with the rinds) into ¼ inch round segments.

Combine the orange juice, orange slices, lime juice, sugar and salt in a saucepan. Bring to a slow simmer over low heat. Cook for 6 – 8 mins. The centers of the oranges will become translucent and tender. Carefully scoop out the orange rounds and place them on a plate. They should not break. Keep aside.

Keep cooking and stirring the syrup for around 12 – 15 mins until it thickens a bit. Remove from flame and set aside. This is the glaze.

For the cake, beat the butter and sugar until fluffy. Add and beat the eggs one by one. Add the reserved orange zest. Stir in the essence. Sift the flour and baking powder together. Add the flour mixture little by little, to the batter and mix until incorporated.

Pour the batter into the pan. Arrange the orange slices on top of the batter in one layer. Bake for 15 mins.

Reduce the temperature to 350 F or 175 C and bake for 35 – 40 mins until the cake is golden brown and baked through. The sides of the cake should be springing away from the pan and a toothpick inserted in the middle should come out clean.

Cool the cake on a wire rack until warm.

Poke holes all over the cake with a toothpick. Brush the glaze on top with a pastry brush. The cake will absorb some of it.

Allow the cake to cool and then unmold.

Orange Coulis

This post is about comfort food. I’m sure all of us have this one particular kind of food that we love, something that reminds us of home, a childhood recipe or cooking that takes us back to the good old times. The recipe that I want to share is one of those that instantly takes me back to the times when I developed a fondness for cooking. Come winter and orange coulis, or sauce as we called it, was made very often. All of us loved it and I clearly remember hovering around my mother in the kitchen whenever she used to make this. I would be fascinated with how the sauce thickens upon cooling and she would get exasperated with all my questions. Even with all the watching, coulis is not something that I have always been very comfortable with and it has been my new year’s resolution to learn how to make this well. This time around I got all the instructions and made this with great trepidation. It turned out so well that I felt that I must share it with you.

Eat this with plain vanilla ice cream or have it like I do – sandwiched with your favorite chocolate sponge cake and vanilla ice cream.

Orange Coulis

Makes ¾ th cup

Ingredients

1 cup orange juice

2 level teaspoons cornflour or cornstarch

2 teaspoons sugar

Juice of ½ lime

A few drops of orange essence

For the orange peel to add in the sauce

Orange peel with the pith removed, cut into thin ¼ inch slices

1 tablespoon water

2 teaspoons sugar

Method

1. To sweeten the orange peel, put all the ingredients in a bowl and heat it (keep stirring all the while) over a low flame for 5 minutes until the sugar solution thickens and the peel softens.
2. In a saucepan, put the orange juice, cornflour and sugar and heat it over a low flame. Keep stirring this for 7 – 8 minutes until the sauce thickens a little bit.
3. Take it off the heat and add the lime juice and orange essence. Add the orange peel and let the sauce cool.
4. Enjoy it with a bowl of vanilla ice cream.

Strawberries with Balsamic Vinegar

Somehow, whenever the strawberry season arrives (that, in India, is winter) I feel a sense of growing excitement. It usually starts around November when roadside hawkers lug around boxes of half ripe, tasteless strawberries and culminates at the end of December – early January, when they are at their best – ripe and bright red. I remember them being the height of luxury in fruits and being a rare treat during my childhood. It is seldom that you get sweet luscious strawberries in India even now.

I prefer strawberries in simple desserts. For instance, strawberries and ice cream or strawberries and whipped cream are my favorites. In fact, one of my favorite memories from Bangalore is going to Corner House or The Edge for strawberries and cream at night with a whole gang from the PG where I stayed. None of the strawberries in a rich chocolate cake for me please.

This dessert is one of the fanciest sounding ones and definitely the easiest. The balsamic vinegar and black pepper intensifies the flavor of the strawberries and I for one love this cold dessert even in the middle of winter. 

Strawberries with Balsamic Vinegar and Black Pepper

Ingredients

200 gms fresh strawberries, washed and hulled

1 tbsp sugar

2 tbsp balsamic vinegar

A pinch of ground black pepper

Method

Slice the strawberries in half. Combine strawberries, sugar, vinegar and pepper in a large bowl. Chill for a few hours or overnight before serving. 

Cherry Cream Tarts

Think of summer. Think of a cool summer breeze and deliciously sweet summer fruits. This is just what this tart is – they’re as light as a breeze with a fluff of whipped cream and a hint of cherries. Each one is tiny, bite sized to be precise. I just kept popping them into my mouth one hot summer afternoon after I had eaten a heavy meal and wanted some dessert (“but something not too sweet or heavy, please!”). They were over in a flash and this time I did not even pretend like I wanted to save some for the family. 

They’re so light and creamy and SO simple to make. All you need are cream and a bowl of cherries. I used the canned variety as the fresh ones were a little sour for my taste. But if you want to use the fresh ones, I’m sure they’ll taste great as well. Sour cherries with cream – they sound good and would provide a balance to the sweetness of the cream.

The tart base is easy though I really need to practice more to get the perfect tart. Oh, and always use ice cold water to make the dough. That is, more ice and less water. The dough should not be sticky so use only one spoonful of water at a time. Another important thing to remember while making tarts is that the dough should never rise while baking. So prick it all over with a fork after pressing it into the tart cases. Then collect a mix of pulses and put some over it before putting it into the oven. This is called blind baking.

 Also, make sure that you pit the cherries and put together the puree before you start whipping the cream. The whipped cream has a slight tendency to melt if left out of the refrigerator (a fact I had forgotten until I was reminded by a mess of melting cream in my bowl). You can also adjust the quantity of cherries that you put in according to your taste. This recipe gives a nice not overpowering flavor. After that, you just have to assemble it all together. Easy- peasy.

 Cherry Cream Tarts

Makes 12 – 15 small tarts

For the tart base

100 gms plain flour

50 gms butter

A pinch of salt (omit if using salted butter)

Ice cold water to make a dough

1. Preheat the oven.
2. Sieve the flour with the salt.
3. Rub in the butter and make a dough using ice cold water.
4. Roll out the dough.
5. Cut into desired size and press into tart cases. Prick with a fork. This is to prevent the dough from rising.
6. Bake blind in an oven at 230 degree Celsius/ 450 degree Fahrenheit for 10 minutes
7. Take them out of the oven and remove the pulses. Bake for another 3 - 4 minutes. Keep a check! They shouldn't burn. 
8. Cool the tart cases.

For the cream filling

120 gms cream

30 grams pitted cherries

A drop of vanilla essence/ cherry brandy (optional)

1. Pit some of the cherries and puree them. Pour in a spoonful of the can syrup as well.
2. Whip the cream.
3. add the pureed mixture to it.

Assembly

1. Put a few pieces of cherries into each tart case.
2. use a piping bag to pipe out the cherry flavoured cream
3. put a piece of cherry on top and voila! It’s done.