Serves 4
Have a play with your favourite autumn fruit in this recipe. Just be careful when poaching the fruit that you don’t overcook and it turns mushy. Any leftover syrups can be refrigerated for 2-3 weeks and are delicious drizzled over a coconut or lemon syrup cake.
Ingredients
- 1 cup caster sugar
- 8 cloves
- 2 cardamon pods, bruised
- 1 stick cinnamon
- juice of 2 lemons
- 2 tsp vanilla paste or 1 vanilla bean split lengthwise
- handful fresh thyme
- fresh rhubarb (5 stems) - cut into 4 cm lengths
- 2 ripe pears (any variety), peeled, cored and cut into thick slices
- 4 ripe green figs
- Fresh pear, julienned - to serve
Coffee and fig syrup
- ½ cup caster sugar
- 2 double shots espresso coffee
- ½ cup amaretto
- 4 dried figs
Method
Place sugar, 1½ cups water, cardamon pods, cinnamon, lemon juice, thyme and vanilla paste into a saucepan and stir over medium heat until sugar has dissolved. Bring to the boil, reduce heat and add rhubarb to the syrup, simmer uncovered for 3-4 minutes. Use tongs to remove rhubarb from the liquid and set rhubarb aside to cool. Add pears to the hot syrup and simmer for 10 minutes. Remove pears with tongs and cool.
Reduce the syrup for a further 10 minutes over medium heat until thick and syrupy. Remove, strain and chill.
In a small saucepan add sugar, coffee and amaretto and heat over medium heat, stirring until sugar dissolved. Add dried figs and simmer until thick. Approx 10 minutes.
Remove from heat.
To serve
- Halve fresh figs.
- In a small bowl place rhubarb and pear. Drizzle over the strained poaching syrup.
- Slice the dried figs and place on top of fruit then place the fresh figs.
- Drizzle over the coffee and fig syrup and top with fresh pear.
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