Percocha peaches Photo ©Evie Saffron Strands
July
It took a while to make an appearance but finally, in the last week of June, summer arrived and with it the glorious fruits of summer. July is the time to make the most of these vitamin and mineral-rich seasonal fruits by eating them now at their peak or preserving them for later in the year.
For the month of July, here is the key short-season produce you can expect to find at Puntarelle & Co along with all the usual staples:
English Soft fruits have been loving the heat and we are lucky to have hand-picked berries from John, our Apple and Pear grower in Kent. Both Strawberries and Raspberries are fabulous this year. Locally-grown English Raspberries, in particular, are unbeatable for flavour. We use these Kent-grown berries in our London Fermentary Kent Raspberry Water Kefir. We also get Blackberries from the same farm in Kent. Large, plump and deeply-flavoured, they are bursting with juice. It’s proving to be a great year for British Blackcurrants too. Gooseberries should be around until mid-July and British Cherries are starting to arrive, taking over from the lovely Provence/French, Italian and Spanish ones we have had for a few weeks now.
Summer Peaches Puntarelle & Co
We are loving our fruits from France, Sicily and other parts of Italy this year. They are all in their sun-ripened glory in July. We have Peaches - yellow, white, blood, flat and percocha. Nectarines too. All ripe and ready to eat or cook with. A highlight of the month of July for London Fermentary is our Peach Water Kefir infused with lemon verbena and raspberry. Apricots are arriving from Southern Italy, they are small but have good flavour. We are expecting to change over to French (hopefully, Bergeron)
Melons are popular at Puntarelle in this warm weather that encourages us to eat more cooling fruits. We are getting our Green Fioroni Figs from Puglia at the moment - large and very juicy.
English Peas
Photo ©Evie Saffron Strands
On the vegetable side, the highlights for July are English Peas . The harvests are as sweet and plentiful as they were last year. English Broad Beans are excellent this year too. We will move into the British Sweetcorn season in July, taking over from the Continental corn cobs. We look forward to its arrival as the British is usually the best of the crop. All British grown herbs are in their prime too!
We expect to get particularly good sun-ripened Italian Ox-Heart Tomatoes (Cuore di Bue) and Vesuvius tomatoes, both varieties are meaty, juicy and very delicious.
On the London Fermentary side of our business, we are delighted to announce our first Inspirational Fermentation Course was completed with great success this summer. The results were exceptional. Thank you to all who attended. It was such a pleasure to teach our first group of talented and creative people. Dates for the next course are set for September 2018. Visit www.londonfermentary.com to book your place (only 5 spaces still available at time of writing).
This is an easy recipe from Evie’s blog for turning ripe cherries into a more special dessert.
Cherries with almonds & Sabayon
Photo ©Evie Saffron Strands
Sabayon is so easy to make. It takes only 2 minutes of whisking with an electric whisk if you want a warm frothy sauce to eat immediately, 5 minutes to produce a 'creamier' one. If you want to make it up to an hour ahead (the one in the photograph above), you just need to keep whisking it off the heat until it has cooled. This stops it separating before you get to eat it.
Cherries with almonds & Sabayon sauce
(Serves 4)
300g cherries
2 tablespoons elderflower cordial
1-2 teaspoons caster sugar
4-5 almonds
For the Sabayon:
1 large egg yolk
1 tablespoon caster sugar