Cooking

Fruity fresh summer

Sonya Verlaque
FCC Culinary Arts Student

Right now our strawberry plant is making flowers, and our blueberry bushes failed last year, but we are hoping for better this season. Many local farms, like Chocolates and Tomatoes in Middletown and Glade Link Farm are having a good berry season so far. So stop by your favorite garden or farm and grab some berries and citrus for inspiration for a cool dessert.

Fresh Lemon-Blueberry Dutch Baby

This is a very fun breakfast to make and turn the light on in the oven and watch it puff up like magic.

Ingredients:

• 4 tablespoons butter, divided
• 1/2 cup (125g) whole or 2% milk
• 1/2 cup (64g) all-purpose flour
• 4 large eggs
• 3 tbs (43g) granulated sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1/4 tsp salt
• the zest of one lemon
• 1 cup (154g) blueberries
• Confectioners sugar for dusting

Preparation instructions: Put 2 tablespoons cold butter in your cast iron skillet and place in the oven as it preheats to 450F. Melt the other two tablespoons in the microwave and put into a blender. Add the milk, flour, eggs, granulated sugar, vanilla, salt, and lemon zest, and blend until smooth. (Do not skip this step — the batter will be lumpy if you do.) Carefully take the cast iron skillet out of the oven with the melted butter and add the blueberries. Shake the skillet to coat the berries in butter and then, immediately pour the batter over the blueberries and transfer the skillet back to the oven. Bake until the pancake is puffed and golden, about 15 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and let it set, it will deflate some, then dust with confectioners’ sugar, cut and serve with syrup or enjoy as is.

Gelo di Melone (Watermelon pudding)

This is a variation on the Sicilian classic gelo di melone, which is steeped with jasmine flowers, the epicurios chefs use 1 tsp of anise seeds in with the boiling water. My kids love watermelon, and after they eat one half of it, this is another way to use the rest. Traditional toppings are chocolate shavings, pistachios, and whipped cream. I also think mint is amazing with watermelon and may also be growing in your garden at home.

Ingredients:

• 6 cups coarsely chopped seeded watermelon (from a 4 1/2-lb piece, rind discarded)
• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• 1/2 cup plus 1 teaspoon sugar
• 2 tsp fresh lemon juice, or to taste
• 1/3 cup heavy cream
• Garnish: chopped shelled pistachios (not dyed red); white or dark chocolate shavings, removed with a vegetable peeler

Preparation instructions: Purée watermelon in a blender until smooth, then pour through a fine-mesh sieve into a 2-quart saucepan, pressing on pulp and then discarding any remaining solids. Ladle about 1/4 cup watermelon juice into a small bowl and stir in cornstarch until smooth. Bring remaining watermelon juice to a boil with 1/2 cup sugar stirring until sugar is dissolved. Stir cornstarch mixture again, then whisk into boiling juice. Reduce heat and simmer, whisking occasionally, 3 minutes. Whisk in lemon juice. Pour pudding through cleaned sieve into a bowl, then transfer to a wide 1-quart serving dish or 6 (2/3-cup) ramekins and chill, uncovered, until cold, about 30 minutes. Cover loosely and chill until set, at least 3 hours. Just before serving, beat cream with remaining 1 teaspoon sugar in another bowl with an electric mixer until it just holds stiff peaks. Top pudding with whipped cream.

Berry Dump Cake

Ingredients:

• 3 cups fresh blueberries
• 3 cups fresh raspberries
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 tsp ground ginger
• 1 tsp grated lemon peel
• 2 tbs fresh lemon juice
• 1 box (15.25 oz) Yellow Cake Mix
• 3/4 cup butter, melted

Preparation instructions: Heat oven to 350EF. Spray 13x9-inch pan with cooking spray. Spread berries evenly in bottom of pan. In small bowl, mix sugar, ginger and lemon peel; sprinkle over berries. Drizzle lemon juice over top. Top with dry cake mix; gently shake pan to distribute evenly. Pour melted butter over top, tilting pan to cover as much of the top with butter as possible. Bake 45 to 50 minutes or until top is light golden brown, mostly dry on top and bubbly around edges. Cool 15 minutes before serving. Top individual servings with ice cream, because: ice cream.

Lemon Posset

This is a very British desert which was historically a tonic made with milk curdled with ale or wine, which sounds like a strange remedy if you are sick. In this recipe the posset sets up like a panna cotta, because of the reaction between the lemon acid and heated cream so there is no need for flour or gelatin. You could use any citrus in this, especially grapefruit or lime. However, I think oranges have a high sugar content so if you choose to use them, I would reduce the amount of sugar in the recipe to about 2/3 cup.

Ingredients:

• 2 1/2 cups Heavy Cream
• 3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons Granulated Sugar
• zest of two lemons
• juice of 3 lemons

Preparation instructions: First wash your lemons with soap, rinse and dry completely to get any wax or chemicals off since you are using the zest. Then zest and juice the lemons and set aside separately. In a large saucepan, heat the whipping cream, zest and sugar over medium high until until you just start to see it boil. Once it’s boiling reduct the heat to medium low and cook another 5-8 minutes making sure the cream doesn’t boil over. Once the cream has cooked down a bit and started to turn slightly golden yellow, remove from heat. Then stir in the lemon juice. Let posset cool about 15 -20 minutes, it will still be pourable but safer to put in containers. Strain through a fine mesh strainer to remove zest and then pour into serving containers or ramekins, and let chill in the fridge for at least 4 hours, but it's best to do overnight. This is fun to serve with any type of berries or whipped cream.