Feeling adventurous? Let's cook creative! Crack up a delicious tomato treat, for the perfect end to a long day.
Tomato and pine nut crumble with tomato, olive and basil ice cream.
Might sound an odd combination but do remember tomato is a fruit, pine nuts are not very dissimilar to almonds and basil has similar attributes to mint. The alternative thought process highlights how strange our views can be when thinking about food.
Crumble topping:
80g Pine nuts
100g Plain flour
80g Demerara sugar
80g Rolled oats
100g Butter
Dash of Olive oil
Large pinch of Dorset tomato basil and olive sea salt.
Roughly chop the butter and rub into the flour, mix in with other ingredients and stir.
Spread out on a baking tray so is a range of rustic pieces as oppsed to rolled flat.
Bake at 170 degrees for approx minutes to dry it out.
Break the crumble up and sprinkle over your fruit. Once baked the mix may be kept in an air tight box till it is needed. Is good for up to a week.
Crumble topping can be used as a accompaniment to yogurt or even a fruit salad.
Custard base for the ice cream
3 large Egg yolks
300ml double cream
300ml milk
120g Sugar
6 sprigs Basil
2 large pinches Dorset basil, tomato and olive sea salt
Heat milk and cream with basil in. When it comes to the simmer, pour it over the sugar and egg mix and heat gently till it coats the back of a spoon. Strain through a sieve and chill the mix. Put the liquid in an ice cream machine or into a bowl in the freezer. Whisk every hour till is frozen to a good consistency. Use within 24hrs otherwise it will freeze solid.
A chefs cheat is to replace half the sugar with an inverted sugar solution. This helps prevent the ice cream from going solid.
Crumble filling
2doz Tomatoes
80ml Olive oil
50g Caster sugar
3 pinches Dorset basil, tomato and olive sea salt
Cut a cross in the tomatoes.
Blanch in boiling water for 15 seconds till skin starts to peel off. Then referesh in iced water till cold.
Drain from water
Peel skin off
Cut into quarters
Scoop flesh from tomato and use in other dishes or stocks
Season the tomatoe petals with the salt, sugar and olive oil. Cook for 40 minutes at 140 degrees.
When cooled put flesh into ramekins or metal rings and cover with the crumble mix.
If you have made too many they can be preserved in oil and used in salads with the likes of a lovely fresh ewes cheese such as Austin from the Book and Bucket Cranborne.
Put ramekins into the oven to heat and serve with the ice cream. Is perfect for dinner parties as is a little different though almost everyone loves a fruit crumble. You can even miss out the ice cream stage and use as a custard to accompany it too.
Mark from La Fosse at Cranborne made a similar dish to this when he worked in a Michelin starred restaurant on the edge of the Pyrenees almost 2 decades ago!