Comments (0)

By clare, February 19, 2010

When Tropical Cusine: Cooking in Clare’s Kitchen comes out I imagine that some readers might presume I am a complete soak from the number of mixed drink and cocktail recipes it will contain.  However, coming up with these recipes is more about playfulness than ensuring a regular alcoholic intake.  They are like a liquid and simple version of a dessert, which is another satisfying realm of recipe testing because of the ease with which one can find and combine flavours and textures.  Ironic really given that I rarely eat desserts myself, although that pattern changed for a while during the recipe testing when I was working mostly on dessert recipes (and my waistline paid the price).

Anyway, todays offering is a take on the look of the Tequila Sunrise, and uses ingredients that are very much part of the identity of this part of the world – rum, red papaya, and the indigenous Davidsons plum.  Here it is, the Sailors Delight:

Sailors Delight

1 tablespoon Davidsons plum syrup, plus 1 teaspoon extra to drizzle around glass

45ml dark rum

1/2 cup pureed ripe red papaya pulp

3/4 cup soda water Continue reading 'Playing at sundown'»

Comments (0)

By admin, December 7, 2009

Duck and Lychee Salad (plum sauce out of shot) image © Catseye Productions 2009

This a such a beautiful combination of flavours, and given the short season of lychees is one to enjoy right now.  As well as this salad recipe, I will have my roast duck recipe in Tropical Cuisine: Cooking for Clare’s Kitchen.  For now, either buy ready roasted duck if you have access to it, roast a duck according to your current recipes, or for a quicker route, pan cook or roast a duck breast per serve.

If you don’t have access to fresh or frozen Davidson Plums, and you can’t buy a ready-made Davidson Plum sauce (try Rainforest Bounty), then you can make a plum sauce using temperate blood plums.

The recipes below are general in their directions, and will be more specific in their final form in the cookbook:

Davidsons Plum Sauce

About 500gm fresh or frozen Davidsons plums

2/3 cup castor sugar

2 cloves

2 cardamom pods, crushed slightly

6 allspice, whole

1/2 tsp salt

water to cover plums

Place plums, spices and salt into a saucepan just big enough to fit them in one layer, cover with water and bring to the boil.  Add castor sugar, and reduce to a low simmer until the sauce has thickened.  Run the mixture through a food mill or pick the stones and spices out by hand then blend with a stick blender.

Duck and lychee salad

to serve 3 – 4 people

1 roasted duck or 4 cooked duck breasts, sliced or torn into edible amounts, excess fat removed

equal amounts of watercress and rocket sprinkled in two layers on each plate

about 8 pitted fresh lychees, torn in 1/2, per person

Compile the salad by laying the rocket then watercress onto each plate, scatter over the duck pieces, the torn lychees, then top with a drizzle of Davidsons plum sauce aiming to get it mostly on the pieces of duck.  Serve.

© Clare Richards 2009-2010