My Version of Peach Melba

MY VERSION OF PEACH MELBA

 Summer is a difficult season to endure in most parts of India,but there are some perks of this season also, namely summer fruits like Mangoes,Peaches

etc. Sometime back I had tried Peach Melba somewhere which is generally made with poaching Peaches in wine and served with vanilla ice cream and raspberry sauce. I wanted to skip wine ,raspberry and Ice cream so I came up with my version of Peach Melba.This can be had chilled and without  additional calories of Ice cream.

SERVES: 2-3 Persons

INGREDIENTS:

For Poaching The Peaches:

3 Peaches

3/4 Cup Sugar

3/4 Cup Water

1 Tsp. of Lemon Juice

1Tsp. Pure Vanilla Extract

 For Stuffing:

1/8 Heaped cup of crumbled Paneer /chenna /cottage cheese

1/8 cup Milk Powder

1/8 cup Pistachios

1 Cardamom crushed

For Paneer:

1 cup Milk

1 Tbsp. of White Vinegar / Lemon Juice, mixed in 1tbsp. of water

For Chocolate Sauce:

1 tbsp. Cocoa Powder

2 tbsp. Sugar

3 tbsp. water

1 tsp. Butter

½ tsp. of vanilla Extract

METHOD:

1.Take a peach and cut it into half along the line which is visible on a peach, and then twist the halves in opposite direction. Now you have two peach halves in your hand, one with a stone in it and one without.  Remove the stone carefully, using the tip of your knife.

 2. Put sugar, water, lemon juice and pure vanilla extract in a pan. Switch on your burner and let it come to a boil, keep stirring in between so that sugar doesn’t burn.

3. As poaching liquid comes to a boil we can add our peaches to it. let  it boil for 4-5 minutes. (I started by putting peaches with the pit side down in syrup and after a while I turned the peaches over, just once is enough.)  Switch off the burner and take out the peaches with a slotted spoon (a spoon with slits or holes)  and allow it to come to room temperature.

5. When peaches are at room temperature , take each half and with your knife try to pull apart its skin, making sure you don’t crush the peach. De skin all the peaches.

6. When all peaches are skinned, put them

 back in the cooled down syrup in which we poached our peaches and  refrigerate for an hour and half, basically get it thoroughly chilled.

7. Now lets start with the stuffing. It won’t take long if you are using store bought paneer, but like me if you are making it yourself, it will take some time but not much. I will explain the process of making paneer or chenna down below.

8. Now take the paneer and crumble it (if you are making your own then paneer would be in crumbly state only). Add milk powder, finely chopped pistachios and powdered cardamom to it and mix well.

9. Check your peaches and when chilled ,take out from syrup and keep aside.(You can use remaining syrup for making Iced Tea)  Make small balls of the stuffing mixture we just prepared and press it lightly in the dents of  these peaches. Prepare all your peaches like this.

 

10. For serving take a bowl or small dessert plate and drizzle some chocolate sauce over the peaches. (you can also drizzle a tsp. of chilled poaching liquid over the peaches ,it makes the peaches look a bit glossy.

You can use ready made chocolate sauce if you have one lying around, or I will write down a quick fix chocolate sauce, because you need very little sauce for this recipe.

 Method for Making Paneeer/Chenna:

Take a cup of milk and put it to boil ,when it comes to boil switch off your burner and wait for 2-3 minutes .

Then dilute your vinegar with equal quantity of water and add it to the milk. Use as much as required to curdle milk. As soon as milk curdles add some ice cubes to it .

Take a sieve or muslin cloth and strain curdled milk. Put strainer on a vessel and in 20 -30 minutes all whey will drain away, and you will have a crumbly paneer ready for stuffing. If you feel there is still some water left in paneer just squeeze it with your hands before you use it for stuffing.

Method for Making Chocolate Sauce:

Take water, sugar, cocoa powder and vanilla extract in a small pan ,mix together with a whisk and put the pan on burner and allow it to come to a boil and then add butter to it let it simmer for 3-4 minutes till it thickens. Switch off your burner and let the sauce cool down to room temperature then put it in refrigerator for 30 minutes or so.

  

My Notes:

In this recipe I have tried to make almost all elements at home,but in case you don’t want to, I will also suggest few shortcuts.

First of all you can use store bought paneer and chocolate sauce. Not making these elements at home wont make too much of a difference to  taste of the dish.

Second shortcut is that you can use canned peaches instead of fresh ones sounds kind of blasphemous but this way you can make the dish in any season. If using canned peaches I would suggest that you add vanilla extract to the peach syrup and bring peaches along with syrup to a boil.

Then cool it ,chill it and use it as the fresh ones.

You can make all the elements of the dish a day ahead also,like prepare your stuffing, poach your peaches,make your chocolate sauce and on the day you want to use put together everything.