The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
Taste the season with Summer Berry Clafoutis
One of the great, great, great (three times, that’s how great it is) pleasures of summer is figuring out what to do with all that fruit that floods the markets. Stone fruits like plums, peaches, nectarines, cherries; melons of all stripes; and berries. Oh, the berries.
We eat them by the fistful when we’re lucky. Did you ever read Robert McCloskey’s “Blueberries for Sal”? It was one of my favorite children’s books, especially the part where Sal and a baby bear meet while overindulging in a thicket of blueberries. When I read that book as a kid, and then later to my own kids, I knew where Sal and that bear were coming from.
But besides funneling them straight into our mouths, there are other excellent ways to use berries. One of my favorites is a clafoutis.
A clafoutis (or clafouti) is a baked dessert of French origin, classically made with cherries — even more classically made with cherries with the pits left in them — all ensconced in a lightly sweetened, pancakelike batter that is poured over the fruit. It puffs up enticingly all around the fruit when it bakes. And it’s great with all kinds of fruit, especially berries.
AND it’s easy. This particular version cools into a custardy cake, and if you can serve and eat it slightly warm, you will be in for heightened deliciousness.
A few cracks may appear as it cools — that’s just the way it goes.
Katie Workman has written two cookbooks focused on easy, familyfriendly cooking, “Dinner Solved!” and “The Mom 100 Cookbook.”