A dish with a silly name gets reborn: clafoutis

Clafoutis (or, clafouti), has been with me for as long as I have been cooking. It's one of those recipes where, once you know how to do it, you can make it in your sleep (you really can). Although there are "rules" for making it (there always are in French cooking), if you were to change it, no one would mind.

This is what Annalena learned: it's an odd word, and it doesn't sound French, because it's not French: it's Occitan, one of the wonderful dialects that are still written and spoken in France (if you've ever listened to "Songs from the Auvergne, and if you haven't, you should, you've heard provencal. There are others. Broaden your education.). Anyway, apparently "clafoutis" derives from the word "clafir" which means to fill. The derivation I read says that it is so called, because you fill a custard with cherries. And indeed, a "proper" clafoutis will always contain cherries and, to some, it will always contain cherries with the pits still in them.

Let's step back now. You can make this dish with any fruit that is in season. I have made it with figs, and I have made it with berries, and I have made it with pears. And EVERY SINGLE TIME I thought "I have GOT to be doing something wrong. This just is not right." See, when you look at a recipe for clafoutis, inevitably you're told to bake it in a baking pan, so that it comes out looking like a big, puffy pancake. When I did it this way, I either got a soft, uncooked mass of eggs, or a tough , almost cloth like thing, that tasted sweet, and fruity, but not at all like a wonderful custard. And know what? That's what happened in restaurants too, where they inevitably gussy up clafoutis with geegaws because, ultimately, this is a peasant dish, as you will see.

Well, the solution seems to be to make this: in ramekins, as if you were making a souffle'. That's how I made it yesterday, and it was more than good. It was SATISFYING good, which means that Annalena did not want to attack a second one.

You can eat this dessert cold, but it somehow loses something at that point. The custard toughens, and the flavors just arent pronounced. If you eat it right out of the oven, it is as puffy as it will get, but it will be wicked hot. I let it set to a slightly warm temperature. It fell a bit, but it was still wonderful.

Let's bake. FIRST, you have to roast cherries. Or any other fruit. To recap, from my ice cream recipe, get a pound of mixed sweet and sour cherries, pit them, and then combine them with 1/3 cup of sugar. Put them on a baking sheet, and bake for fifteen minutes at 350. You will get some syrup as well as some shriveled cherries.

Put them aside, while you put together the clafoutis.

The ingredients couldn't be easier. You need 3 tablespoons of sugar, 2 tablespoons of flour, 2 separated, large eggs, and 1/3 cup of cream. You combine the egg yolks, the flour and the sugar, and mix them to a paste. Now add the cream and stir this all together.

Separately, whip up the egg whites, to soft peaks. WHen you have them, fold them into the batter.

Get yourself four large ramekins: mine haveten ounce capacity, and they were a bit too big. That means you can put something on top of them, if you like. Butter them, and then divide the cherries equally in between them, or put extra in the one you're going to eat. Pour the syrup into the batter. Now, divide the batter over the fruit. Put the ramekins on a baking dish, put that in the oven, and bake for 20-30 minutes. For the first ten minutes, you will be convinced you did something wrong. At twenty minutes, they will have swollen, and risen, and be browning. You can take them out now, or you can leave them to bake for another ten, or even twenty minutes, depending on how dark you like them.

Is that easy or what? Can you say "I'm going to double the recipe?"

A few "cultural" things. Traditionally, the cherries are not pitted for this dish, and that's just fine with Annalena, who has rotten teeth but knows enough to look for pits even when things are pitted. Some say that the pits, if left in the dish, give it a slight almond flavor, just like the noyau of apricot pits. If you wish, and you are serving the dessert to people who can be counted on to be careful, then by all means, try it with the pits. If not, or, for example, you are serving children, if you want that almond flavor, a drop or two of almond extract or amaretto (or, if you have made your own noyau liqueur, which a fellow blogger is doing), add some of that.

Play with this. If I could find folks who would like it, I would make this with figs, and chartreuse liqueur. One with blueberries and lemon may be in the future too. And comes the fall, here come the quinces.

Fast, easy, traditional, and good. "Tres bien."