Lemon verbena posset with spiced summer berries and East Yorkshire sugar cakes by James Mackenzie
Ingredients
(Makes four glasses)
For the posset
500ml double cream
Fresh lemon verbena to taste
Juice of 2 lemons
125g castor sugar
For the spiced fruits
1/2 glass red wine
1 cinnamon stick
2 star anise
1 pinch mixed spice
200g sugar
1 punnet raspberries
1 punnet blackberries
1 punnet redcurrants
1/2 punnet strawberries
100ml red fruit purée
For the East Yorkshire sugar cakes
250g melted butter
125g caster sugar
375g plain flour
2tsp nutmeg grated
Ground cloves to taste
Method
Boil the cream with the lemon verbena. When boiling, add sweetened lemon juice (fresh, or it might curdle) and stir until mixed. Sieve and pour into serving glasses. Chill for at least two hours.
For the spiced fruit, boil the red wine, cinnamon, star anise, mixed spice and sugar. Then add the red fruits and purée. Stir and remove from heat.
For the sugar cakes, mix all the ingredients together into a dough, then roll into a thick sausage shape. Rest in the fridge for at least 30 minutes. Take from the fridge and cut into rounds 1cm thick. Bake like biscuits on a non-stick oven tray for 10 minutes at 170°C. Cool on a wire rack.
To assemble, take a glass with the lemon posset and spoon over the warm spiced fruit. Garnish with a couple of sugar cakes and a sprig of fresh lemon verbena.
This can be made at any time of year: just omit the lemon verbena and replace the summer berries with pears, apples, bramble fruits, etc.
James Mackenzie, chef-patron, the Pipe and Glass Inn, South Dalton, East Yorkshire
