Clafoutis Aux Cerises

When the cherry season arrives in Limousin in the massif central France, famed for its dark red almost black cherries, a delicious dish called clafoutis can be seen in every boulangerie. This has been so since the 1800's. It is now a recipe that has spread throughout France and other parts of the globe, as once tasted it is hard to forget. Each maker of a cherry clafoutis offers up their own version. Some are puffed and brown almost like a cherry toad in the hole, others, dense and creamy, and some thin like pancakes. Every kitchen, in every house, a family guards their own particular family recipe. This means that there is no defined recipe, one is free to experiment, make it their own, which I love. The name clafoutis originates from the ancient language of Occitan, spoken in southern France, in a few places still. Translated it means 'to fill', in connection to this dish it means simply to fill the batter with cherries. When the batter is filled with other fruits, like apricots, sweet plums or even vegetables like courgettes or caramelised red onions, it becomes a 'flaugnarde'. A clafoutis is just for cherries and cherries alone. I love that too.

Traditionally cherry clafoutis would have been eaten for breakfast in many kitchens across Occitania. The cherries shaken from a tree, no doubt, from just outside of a kitchen door. Maybe just some milk and flour and a little sugar used. A scrumptious start to the day however created in my book. The key to success with a clafoutis lies with the ripeness of the cherry. They must be at their very best, ripe, thin-skinned, and ready to explode in your mouth upon biting. At their peak. Unpitted cherries to the clafoutis expert is the only way to go. Pitting them would be missing a point. The kernels exude an almond aroma which no manufactured essence would ever give. Do not forget to tell your guests that they are there however.

In my version I have briefly cooked the cherries first with a little sugar and lemon zest in a hot oven. This seems to plump them up to their optimal juiciness, which then bleeds like a syrup into the creamy batter as it sits overnight. The batter is made with double cream which gives the clafoutis a luxurious custard like texture and the inclusion of a few almond flakes gives the dish a very light crunch. This is a successful marriage between cherry and almond and one that could only have been made in heaven.

Make your clafoutis the evening before you need it and keep it in the fridge, bringing it to room temperature just before serving. The custard sets and the cherries will release their juice. Finally give it a light dusting of powdered sugar. Eaten alongside a strong short coffee it will keep you happy until lunchtime. Cherry clafoutis is not a tricky dish to make, but it will surely be remembered by anyone who eats it for a very long time. This breakfast will make you look forward to cherry season just so you can eat one. I love cherries, and can put one in my mouth with the stalk still on, eat the cherry and then tie a knot in the stalk with my tongue.

Clafoutis Aux Cerises

Serves 6

4 tblspns rice flour

120 gms fine golden caster sugar plus a sprinkle for the cherries

250ml double cream

2 whole room temperature free range eggs plus 2 yolks

500 gms fat dark red juicy cherries

zest of 1 unwaxed lemon

small handful almond flakes

2 tspns good vanila extract

tiny pinch of salt

butter for greasing

Preheat oven to 220C/425F/Gas mark 7

First make your batter as this will need to rest for 40 minutes before baking. To your cream sieve in the sugar, rice flour and salt. Add the vanilla and pour in the cream, beat well. Carefully add the eggs and yolks, one at a time and combine well until frothy. Set aside for 40 minutes, covered at room temperature.

Take a flan dish, traditionally an earthenware dish was used for this recipe, so that is what I use. Wash and throughly dry the cherries, taking care not to bruise them, remove the stalks. Put them into the dish and sprinkle with some sugar and the zest of the lemon, let them roll around in the mix. Put it in the oven for 10 minutes. By this time they should have darkened and look glossy. Take care not to burn the sugar or burst their skins.

Remove the cherries gently and set aside whilst you butter your earthenware dish. Replace the cherries evenly around the base of the dish leaving some gaps for the batter to run. Now give your batter another whisk and pour the batter carefully around the cherries, almost to the top. Then sprinkle the almonds over the top, some sink in to the batters others rest on top and turn crunchy brown in the oven.

Place the dish on a baking tray and put in the middle of your oven until it has turned golden in colour and it is cooked right through. Around 30 minutes. Test the middle with a cocktail stick if you are unsure, it should come out clean when cooked. When you remove it from the oven the sound this dish makes is wonderful, like an electrical experiment by Tesla. The cherries releasing their juice and it hitting the hot batter is a sound to behold. 

Let it be now to work its magic. Leave it to cool and once it has sunk a little in the middle cover and put away in the fridge. Try and forget about it until the morning. About two hours prior to serving remove it and uncover it and let it reach room temperature. Then dust lightly with a little icing sugar. Your clafoutis is ready.

'I want to do to you what spring does with the cherry trees.'Pablo Neruda 1904-1973 Chilean Poet