Great recipe for (bruised) peaches

Inspired by the lady who writes the blog my tiny plot in the UK, I had a sudden yearning for peaches.

It’s Chinese peach season here in Hong Kong, although it seems utterly impossible to buy them ripe or un-bruised.

In fact, I’d almost go as far as saying it’s almost impossible to buy any fruit un-bruised in the supermarkets.  There seems to be a distinct lack of care by shelf-stackers, (and don’t even get me started on the amount of inedible “fresh” produce that remains on shelves…)

So, instead of remaining frustrated about this situation, I have set about finding recipes I can use to work around these irritants, and this is my favourite so far.

Spiced Peaches:

4 peaches or nectarines – gently washed, and quartered, or eighth-ed depending on the size, (mine were huge therefore 1/8thd)

1 vanilla pod, halved lengthways

3-4 green cardamon pods split (I quite like scattering the seeds through the dish and don’t mind crunching them when I eat it, but that might not be to your taste)

2 star anise broken up a bit

1 large stick of cinnamon broken in two (best get proper cinnamon, big sticks of thin bark rolled up like tobacco leaves, not the hulking great logs of thick bark)

1 tablespoon of honey (nothing too strong tasting)

good 1/2 glass-full glass of white wine or rosé or sauterne or peach liquor or orange juice (my favourite so far is sauterne)

Arrange artfully in a dish, and cover. Throw it in a moderate oven (180°C ) for 25 minutes (or a slower oven for longer) until the peaches are soft (can take longer if they are really unripe).

I usually turn them over half way through to jiggle up all the spices, and to get the fruit to suck up the liquid. Make sure there is enough juice as it’s really tasty. If it looks like it’s drying out just throw some more liquid in. I usually take the cover off with 5 minutes or so to go to syrup up the sauce.

Alternatively you could bag this all up in double foil parcels and sling on the bbq. After 10-15 mins (depending on how hot your bbq is and ripeness of peaches), I would suggest poking holes in the top so that some of the liquid can evaporate and get all syrupy, and cooking for just another 5 mins.

And, if in Hong Kong you don’t have an oven, no fear, just put them in a covered pan on the hob and simmer very gently until soft, making sure the syrup doesn’t dry out or catch, so maybe add a bit more juice to it, (or water, and then boil off to syrup at the end having taken the peaches out).

Eat with greek yoghurt or ice cream and they are just scrumptious.

I’ve recently fallen in love with cardamon and it works really, really well in this dish. I also added a couple of cloves last time out, and they didn’t overpower the dish at all which was a relief.  Just throw in what you fancy really, difficult to go wrong, just make sure you use whole spices not ground.