Tart Bites: Cherry Clafoutis

Transcribed by Otter.ai; Lightly edited by Linda. Please forgive typos or grammar errors.

Episode 343 - Cherry Clafoutis

3:47

Linda 00:00

Welcome to Tart Words. I'm your host, Linda Hengerer. And I'm a writer, a reader, and a baker. I talk to writers about their latest book and what inspires them, chat with fellow author Suzanne Fox about what writers can learn from reading their favorite authors, and share fast and easy recipes for anyone looking for a sweet treat. Join me as I share Tart Bites, Tart Thoughts, and Tart Words. 

Today on Tart Bites, I'm making Cherry Clafoutis.

My mother was a Home Economics major in college. She worked in a test kitchen and used one of the first microwave ovens (1950s) and worked for an advertising agency styling food. She loved Julia Child’s show on PBS, and would sit on a stool writing down the recipes before she bought the cookbooks. 

She made Julia’s Cherry Clafoutis recipe often enough for it to be a summer dessert favorite. I know it can be made using other fruit, but I’ve always had it with cherries.

My grocery store had a bounty of cherries in July, and they were on sale. I bought several pounds and gorged on cherries, and still had plenty left over. What to do?

Cherry Clafoutis! 

I pitted the cherries until I had enough to fill a glass tumbler. I tried pushing the pit with a chopstick into a bottle, but the chopstick splintered and broke, so I used a knife and my fingers to remove the pits.

The mixing time is fast; the baking takes a bit of time, but this is an easy recipe to make. I’ll use other ripe, seasonal fruit when I make this again.

Ingredients:

4 eggs

½ cup sugar

½ tsp salt

1 cup milk

1 Tbsp vanilla

2 Tbsp Kirsch liqueur (optional)

¾ cups all-purpose flour

2 Tbsp melted butter

2 cups pitted cherries, halved

Confectioner’s/Powdered sugar for dusting

Whipped cream or ice cream (optional)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter and flour a 9-inch round pie dish or cast-iron skillet, or an 8-inch square baking dish. Set aside.

In a blender, combine eggs, sugar, salt, milk, vanilla, Kirsch (if using); blend until combined. Add flour and blend until just combined; add melted butter and pulse to incorporate into batter.

If you don’t want to use a blender, use a mixing bowl and a whisk to combine ingredients in the same order.

Pour batter into prepared dish and top with the cherries, cut-side up. 

Bake for 45 minutes or until custard is set and the edges are lightly browned. A knife or toothpick should come out clean or with just a few bits of cooked custard. 

Remove from the oven and let cool. Dust with confectioner’s/powdered sugar.

This can be served warm, at room temperature, or cold. 

If serving warm, a scoop of vanilla ice cream would make a lovely sauce as the warm custard melts the frozen ice cream. 

I served this for dessert with a bit of whipped cream and a stemmed cherry on top.

Thank you for joining me this week. To view the complete show notes and the links mentioned in today's episode, visit tartwords.com/tart343. Follow now in the app you're using to listen to this podcast or sign up for email alerts through an easy signup form for bakers, readers, and writers at tartwords.com/about. Thank you again for joining me, Linda Hengerer, for this episode of Tart Bites.