I feel I’ve one thing fallacious with me. I appear to be stricken with a specific illness that forces me to purchase manner too many summer time fruits after they’re in season. It will get significantly dire when confronted with apricots and cherries, two fruits whose seasons are a lot shorter than the others. The primary recent apricots I noticed have been again in upstate New York, across the Nineteen Eighties, and I’d by no means seen them earlier than. Somebody introduced us a basket of the tender, squishy little orange fruits to the restaurant that I labored at, and I keep in mind being utterly taken off guard, as the one apricots I’d ever seen have been the dried ones. And whereas I liked the crinkly dried specimens, these recent beauties with a crimson blush have been a complete different style solely.
Then, once I moved to California, I found how plentiful recent apricots are (or will be), as they’re in France. However irrespective of how plentiful – or not – cherries are when the season is in full swing, I at all times take into account them extra-special fruits and provides a outstanding place in my kitchen. Firstly of the season, they’re extremely costly and barely good. Then, because the season strikes alongside, they begin exhibiting up in bigger mounds on the market, and the costs get gentler, coaxing me to purchase as many as I can heft.
This week, I used to be helpless when confronted with an overload of summer time fruits on the market. And along with an enormous bag of apricots, two bulging sacks of tomatoes, and eight white nectarines, I purchased 2 kilos (about 4 1/2 kilos, give or take a number of cherries) of recent cherries — and from the seems of the opposite consumers, it was greater than any regular individual would purchase. (Though I feel I made the seller’s day.) However I couldn’t assist it. They have been Burlat cherries and I’d purchased a small bag from the identical vendor final week on the market, and there he was once more, tempting me with extra. As soon as I obtained dwelling, I obtained my cherry pitter out, and pitted half of them, saving the others to eat recent. (Besides I virtually polished off the recent ones I used to be reserving as I used to be pitting these!)
Recent cherries are, after all, nice recent. However cooking them can deepen, and even enhance their taste, particularly good should you get dwelling and end up with a bag of relatively wan ones. Or ones that you just would possibly snag on the finish of the market, when the distributors try to eliminate any extras which may not preserve till the subsequent market day.
Along with being the reply to what the heck you (or I) are going to do with all these cherries, this recipe additionally deftly solutions that age-old query: Can I freeze that? And the reply is a giant, resounding, “Heck, yeah!” As soon as the compote has cooled, it freezes completely in zip-top freezer baggage or different containers that you just favor to make use of, and can last as long as a yr. (You can too freeze pitted recent cherries on their very own as nicely.)
And let me inform you, it’s nice to bump into a bag of cherry compote which will have moved to an unfavorable place in your freezer as summer time shifted into fall – or winter, after they can turn into rapidly forgotten. As soon as defrosted, and maybe rewarmed, they’re terrific served with vanilla ice cream, plain yogurt, or alongside a cake, resembling almond cake, gâteau de savoie, or angel meals cake.
I like to spice up their taste with a handful of dried bitter cherries, added halfway throughout cooking, in order that they plump up and take in the cherry juices, which add one other dimension of cherry taste. A shot of kirsch additionally dials up the flavour properly.
Cherry Compote
You’ll want to use a bigger pot that you just assume. For two kilos (1kg) of cherries, I used a 6-quart (6l) pan. Because the cherry juices will foam up as they cook dinner, utilizing a bigger pot – and eradicating the lid from time-to-time – will preserve your from having to wash up a sticky mess.
I’ve didn’t use a lot sugar right here, so you may add extra to style, in case your cherries aren’t as candy as mine have been. If you may get bitter cherries, be at liberty so as to add some rather than the candy cherries. If that’s the case, chances are you’ll want to extend the sugar slightly, to style as nicely.
- 2 kilos (1kg) recent cherries
- 1/4 cup (50g) sugar
- cup (40g) elective: 1/3 dried bitter cherries
- 2 teaspoons kirsch, (or one other fruit-based liqueur, or eau-de-vie)
- 1-2 drops pure almond extract
Forestall your display from going darkish
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Stem and pit the cherries. Put them in a big, nonreactive pot or saucepan and stir in sugar. Flip the warmth to medium, cowl, and cook dinner for 10 minutes, lifting the lid and stirring them continuously, to encourage juicing and to verify the liquid the cherries exude doesn’t foam up and overflow.
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After 10 minutes of cooking, add the bitter cherries, if utilizing, and cook dinner for five to 10 extra minutes, till the cherries are wilted and utterly cooked by way of.
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Take away from warmth and stir within the kirsch and almond extract. Let cool earlier than storing or serving. The juices will thicken because the compote sits.
Storage: The cherry compote will be saved within the fridge for as much as 5 days. It may be frozen for as much as one yr.
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