fruit – Page 27 – Myfrenchkitchen

I had a crazy craving for pineapple yesterday, so I went on a hunt and found the sweet Victoria from South Africa, the big green andwatery pineapple produced in Costa Rica, coming from Miami, Florida????…. and lastly the heavy, bland one from the Ivory coast. First painting them(and in the meantime eating some), I afterwards made a carpaccio from the small , sweet Victoria, which has a beautiful dark yellow colour and an intense flavour.

…Pineapple carpaccio with saffron syrup and pine nuts…

Take a pineapple of your choice(I prefer the small dark yellow Victoria), peel and cut into thin slices.
Arrange on dessert plates.
In the meantime, bring a 1/2 cup of water to the boil, add 1/4 cup of sugar, a pinch of saffron threads, juice of half a lemon and zest of a lemon. (Be careful fro too much saffron, it is very powerful. Two to three strings on 1/2 cup water is plenty) Reduce until syrupy, about 15 minutes. If you want a thicker syrup, simmer for longer.
Leave aside to cool down.
Dry roast a handful of pine nuts in a pan, leave to cool.
Spoon some juice over the pineapple slices, decorate with some pineapple leaves and sprinkle with the roasted pine nuts.

One Victoria pineapple serves 2 people

…Gigi…

I can’t imagine who wants to side step dessert…!

I’m a dessert person, however small it may be. Just don’t heap up my plate with mountainous triangles of cheesecake! A dessert is the ending to a good meal, as a small starter is the beginning… just like a story. A meal is story telling after all. Like any good story, it needs an attention grasping first sentence to create anticipation. And it needs a creative ending to make the reader sit back with a sigh of contentment and contemplate the delight of escaping in dreams and living and being…

A small, light dessert, mostly with some kind of fruit does exactly that for me. With an espresso afterwards. Maybe a chocolate as well. A sensual experience. Then I too can sit back and contemplate the delight of living, breathing and eating….

Papillote with saffron-pineapples and raspberries.

To prepare one papillote: cut a rectangle of baking paper about 40cm long. Fold the two long lengths over to the middle, overlapping by 3 cm and press folds in the paper. Fold the two short sides over to the middle and press folds in the paper. When you open up your paper, you will clearly see the folds of the little rectangle in the middle of your paper. That is where you filling will go.
Filling: A handfull of pineapple chunks, cut to your desired size.
A few raspberries.
Grated lime rind
Freshly squeezed lime juice
Fresh passion fruit pulp
Honey
A few strands of saffron.

Fold your papillotes and place them, opened up, on a baking sheet.
Place in the middle of each papillote some pineapple and raspberries. Sprinkle with a strand or two of saffron. Drizzle with some lime juice and honey and top with passion fruit pulp.
Close the papillote by folding the long ends over the filling, overlapping on top. Take each short end on the side of the filling and twist to opposite sides like a candy wrapper. Fan open up the wrapper ends to make attractive twists.
Bake in a preheated oven at 210 degrees C for about 15-20 minutes.
Leave to cool. Place the papillotes on individual plates, pull open the overlapping tops and serve slightly warm with Bulgarian joghurt on the side.