Passionfruit…

Apologies to anyone who is on my author mailing list – you will have already seen this…

The days are getting longer – and warmer. Sunrise is now well before 6am and Spring is definitely in the air.

At the markets strawberries and avocadoes are still cheap. This week I bought 3 x 500g punnets of amazing strawberries for just $5. Although not strictly yet in season, passionfruit are also plentiful and, at $4 for a bag of about 12, are already quite affordable.

I’ve been having  passionfruit most mornings for breakfast. Unsweetened natural yoghurt from Maleny cheese, strawberries, and a handful of Pip’s Real Food crunch. All local, all fresh, all good.

I also took an entire bag of passionfruit and turned them into curd. This turned out so well that I’m considering replacing the lemon curd on my Christmas pavlova with this instead. As an aside, if you need the recipe for the lemon curd pav, you’ll find it in Simply Nigella or here on Nigella’s site.

We also spooned it into little pastry cases for a simple dessert and topped it with sliced strawberry. I could, of course, have used the leftover egg whites for a quick meringue, but I was too lazy. Grant and Sarah spooned it onto fresh baguette with fake spray can cream. They were in heaven, but I’m still wondering who brought that canned fake cream into the house.

Anyways, if you want the recipe, you’ll also find it in Nigella’s Feast book or here. Apparently it freezes ok, but I haven’t tried that yet.

I’m not really sure whether this is a terrine or a panna cotta, but panna cotta, but nor do I think the name makes a huge amount of difference for our purposes. Although according to wikipedia – so it must be true – a panna cotta is an Italian “dessert of sweetened cream thickened with gelatine and molded.” This has sweetened cream, gelatine, and is molded. Tick, tick and tick.

Anyways, thanks to the yoghurt it’s not as heavy as a pannacotta normally is, and thanks to the vanilla and lime rind, it’s also not as sweet.

Sadly there are no photos as these looked crap on the plate – white on white with just a little interest from the yellow of the passion fruit pulp on top…boring. But then, I’ve never pretended to be a food stylist. It’s how they taste that matters…

This recipe makes 6 small panna cottas. What you can do is double the recipe and pour it into a (cling film lined) larger container (like a loaf tin or a small ice cream container?) and scoop it out instead.

What you need…

• 300ml cream. I get ours from the markets – it’s local, and it’s good.
• ¼ cup sugar. If you have a real sweet tooth you can add more, but this amount is, I think, fine.
• 2 – 3 strips of lime peel. Cut this with a vegetable peeler so you have no pith
• 1 tbsp lime juice
• 1 tsp vanilla essence – or a vanilla bean if you have any in the pantry
• 2 sheets gelatine – I used titanium strength
• 300ml greek style yoghurt
• 1 – 2 tbsp passionfruit juice (no pulp)
• Extra passionfruit pulp to serve

 

What you do with it…

• Heat the cream, lime rind, vanilla and sugar in a small pan. Bring it just to a simmer, take out the lime rind, and remove it from heat.
• Soften the gelatine sheets in cold water for a few minutes until they’re all squidgy. Squeeze out all the excess water and stir into the hot cream. Whisk in the yoghurt, passionfruit juice and lime juice until it’s smooth.
• If you’re using individual molds, line these with cling film. I find this a real palaver in that it leaves little marks on the panna cotta from where the plastic is uneven. You can pour it straight into the cold and hope you can get it out in one piece without resorting to hot water and potentially melting it – I’ll leave that choice with you.
• Serve with passionfruit pulp.