Cherry Clafoutis

Over the school holidays Chef is spending some time in the kitchen with the mini-chefs teaching them how to cook simple things – and last weekend Clafoutis was on the menu! Clafoutis is a French dessert which is easy to make and even easier to eat – it packs a lot of flavour and is traditionally made with un-pitted cherries (although we pitted our cherries for ease of eating and to make it safe for the mini-chefs). On this day we had lots of fresh cherries in the fridge which needed to be used so Clafoutis seemed to be the logical thing.
It is perfect served still warm from the oven with a cup of coffee and a dollop of cream!

Cherry Clafoutis - serves 8

You'll need - 
300g fresh sweet cherries, stemmed and pitted
25 g butter, melted, plus extra for greasing
2 eggs
125 ml milk
125 ml cream
80 g plain flour
100 g sugar
Pinch salt
Vanilla essence
Icing sugar for dusting

         

 

Preheat the oven to 185 ºC.

Smear a 24 cm shallow baking dish liberally with butter.
Lay the cherries in a single layer in the baking dish.
In a bowl mix the sugar, butter, milk, cream, flour, eggs, salt and vanilla essence together until smooth.
Pour the batter over the cherries.
Bake the clafoutis for about 35- 40 minutes until golden brown and set.
Let it cool for 10 minutes, then sprinkle with icing sugar and serve while still warm. 

 

For the grown up version you can macerate the cherries with 30 ml of cognac or kirsh.

Enjoy!