yogurt
Cheese in Oil and Spiced cheese spreads
Handmade cheese has a flavor unlike any store bought, not simply because of the small batch and uniqueness of the process. It is as much because it was made with the warmth of hand, and possibly your own, rather than the cold steel kiss of industrial factories.
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This fruity frozen dessert pairs beautifully with this gluten free peach pound cake!
In class recently, we discussed "Flavor" as an objective tool and how to measure it as a function of certain parameters. Our professor, Peter Klosse, a restauranteur and academician, argued that if you can separate Flavor the object from Flavor the experience then we can create a language of understanding that can unite and bring together people! What a wonderfully fascinating idea??!! I was really taken by that concept of using science to find a way to connect and hope to explore it more...
Anyway, ice cream was one of the examples that we choose to look into....
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Ice Crunch!
It is that time of the year when licking, biting, slurping cold and frozen things are entirely normal cravings. Along with this seasonal shift of palate comes a change in the colors on our plate. The markets are now overflowing with fruits of every color in the vibrancy range and I am really trying very hard to hold myself back from picking up one of everything!
Then, my attempts in self-policing are significantly encumbered by the wide variety of food porn I subscribe to. For several weeks, I have been inundated with photos of ice creams and popsicles. Eventually, I realised I simply cannot continue with this masochistic endeavor and had to succumb to Amazon and get myself a popsicle maker!
Now on to phase 2, or the agonizing on flavors. Berries, berries, berries. It was like a trance. I could not get away from them and somehow, I managed to get through the clinging tentacles (or rather thorns) of the bright pinks, reds and deep purples and laid eyes on a lovely ripe papaya. It sang to me.
You see, to understand why, I must take you back to my childhood world of India and my grandparents garden......
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Gluten Free pockets with raw sugar and cardamom roasted Asian pears finished with sweetened yogurt and pomegranate.
Hand pies has always had a certain tug in my heart. The always bring to my mind the image of a child's hand in an adult, being lovingly carried through life. It brings vivid imaginations of baking together with your mom or grand mom, making little versions of adult people food. Having never had that experience in any form, I find this image entirely soothing and sweet. So, please do not shatter it with reality of them being just gimmicks or something of the sort. I will stick my dream of them being small people pies!
These pies are more biscuit like than flaky but I find that crunch a very alluring balance to the softness of poached fruit inside. My filling was a resilient, raw cane sugar and cardamom roasted small asian pears. But, you can just as easily use rhubarb or berries or other smaller fruits in season.
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Eating a slice of cardamom pavlova filled with thick honeyed yogurt and topped with a strawberry compote made with market strawberries flash frozen from last season.
I have slowly been making headway into the fruits I had frozen from last year market season. As I type, I only have half a bag left! I cooked the first batch into a compote to top on Pavlova here and several breakfasts of crunchy granola. I love the textural balance of the crunch from the granola, melting yogurt, yielding into the fleshy softness of the fruit compote. That was the same allure that this combination of meringue crunch, strained thick yogurt laced with honey and cardamom topped with generous dollops of compote had for me.
This pavlova - It is simple, delicious and yet decadent in a especially frivolous way! Perfect for a weekend when the weather is not quite warm but surely past the grasp of cold.... Like today.
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