Tag Archives: seasonal baking

Peach and Ricotta Spelt Scones

Summertime in the south means peaches, peaches, peaches! These ephemeral delights are best enjoyed at peak ripeness, whether raw, baked, blitzed into ice cream, or preserved. For this peach and ricotta spelt scones recipe, adding a bit of spelt flour into the all-purpose helps the mixture stand up to the juicy peach chunks, while ricotta makes for a moist, loose crumb. With just 1/4 cup of brown sugar, these scones are scarcely sweet at all, allowing the peach flavor to really shine!

These scones are not a low-fat food! While the addition of real fruit chunks and spelt flour does help to offset the added sugar, ingredients like ricotta, heavy cream, and butter bring the dough together. Fat content aside, these scones are fun to bake and a treat to eat.

What is Spelt Flour?

If you are a seasoned baker, you understand different flours tend to behave…differently. Some have higher protein content than others, like bread flour. Some have low protein content like cake flour. Then there’s the wide range of alternative flours, like rice, tapioca, chickpea, amaranth, etc. And let’s not forget about whole wheat!

While each of these flours is worthy of a lengthy discussion in and of themselves, let’s start by taking a look at spelt flour.

Spelt flour is a stone-ground ancient grain that was a precursor to modern wheat. It can be used in lieu of all-purpose flour or, commonly, whole wheat.

Once a prolific crop in the Middle Ages, spelt flour has a pleasant, sweet and nutty flavor. It adds a reddish tint to your baked goods, and is capable of light and airy baking. Whole grain spelt flour and spelt berries are available at most grocery stores or online at Bob’s Red Mill’s website.

Reasons to Use Spelt Flour

Whole grain spelt flour is an ample amount of fiber as well as:

  • Vitamins B1, B3, B6
  • Vitamin E
  • Calcium
  • Magnesium
  • Manganese
  • Iron
  • Phosphorus
  • Selenium
  • Zinc

This is a far cry from all-purpose flour, even enriched flour, which has additives not naturally occurring in the wheat flour. For a list of the nutrition facts of enriched flour, click here.

Furthermore, spelt flour helps in reducing blood sugar spikes after eating, making these scones taste even sweeter. Because of spelt’s easy digestibility, it has even been shown to reduce inflammation in the gut and promote healthy digestion!

Ways to Use Spelt Flour

Spelt flour is more versatile than it might seem! A wonderful way to begin incorporating spelt flour into your baking is to add it half and half with regular flour. (For example, if a recipe calls for 3 cups of flour, add 1.5 cups of all-purpose flour and 1.5 cups of spelt flour.)

When you’re not making peach and ricotta spelt scones, some popular ways to use spelt flour include:

  • cakes
  • muffins
  • waffles or pancakes
  • breads
  • cookies

Looking for a savory application? Check out this recipe for herbed spelt scones packed with parsley and lemon zest!

Juicy Peach and Ricotta Spelt Scones

This recipe comes together with a few choice ingredients. Gather your perfectly ripe peach, dry ingredients, ricotta, cream, and lemon.

ricotta peach scones ingredients

Then add butter to your whisked dry ingredients and chop your peaches.

chopped peaches, ricotta, butter in dry ingredients

Cut the butter into the dry ingredients using a pastry cutter, fork, or your fingers.

cut butter

Toss in your chopped peaches.

chopped peaches in butter and flour

Mix to incorporate, then mix your buttermilk with your ricotta.

wet and dry ingredients

Mix the wet into the dry ingredients until just incorporated.

Shaping Your Peach Ricotta Scones

peach ricotta spelt scone dough

Mold into a disk about 1 inch thick on a floured surface. Cut into 8 even triangles, or into squares if you prefer.

peach spelt dough disk

I chose triangles 🙂

cut peach scones

Brush with cream before baking.

peach scones brushed with cream

If you like, sprinkle some large crystal sugar over the top of these beauties!

cream brushed scones

Bake for 15-17 minutes aaaand…

finished peach and ricotta spelt scones

Best eaten warm. These scones keep wrapped up tight or in an airtight container up to 3 days.

juicy peach and ricotta spelt scones

Juicy Peach and Ricotta Spelt Scones (Low Sugar)

Based of of Smitten Kitchen's Rasperry Ricotta Scones recipe!
Print Recipe Pin Recipe
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 15 minutes
Total Time 17 minutes
Course Appetizer, Breakfast, Dessert, Snack
Cuisine American, baking, Intuitive, Seasonal, traditional
Servings 8 scones

Equipment

  • pastry brush

Ingredients
  

  • 1 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1 cup spelt flour
  • 1 Tbs baking powder
  • 3/4 tsp kosher salt
  • 1/4 cup dark brown sugar
  • 6 Tbs cold butter, cut into pieces
  • 1 heaping cup peaches, cut into cubes (about one large peach)
  • 3/4 cup whole milk ricotta
  • 1/3 cup heavy cream, plus more for brushing
  • 1/2 lemon, seeds removed, juiced
  • large crystal sugar for sprinkling (optional)

Instructions
 

  • Preheat the oven to 425°F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone mat.
  • Add strained lemon juice to heavy cream and stir. Let mixture sit 10-15 minutes.
  • Whisk dry ingredients together in a large mixing bowl and set aside. Cut the peach into cubes and remove the pit. Cut butter into 1 Tbs pieces.
  • Using a pastry cutter, fork, or your fingers, cut the butter into the combined dry ingredients. Once the mixture resembles coarse crumbs, add the peach chunks and stir to combine.
  • Combine ricotta and heavy cream with lemon juice (buttermilk replacement). Using a spatula, mix the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients until just combined.
  • Heavily flour a countertop or cutting board and shape the dough into a disc about 1" thick. Cut into 8 even scones (square or triangular work).
  • Place scones on baking sheet, brush heavy cream and sprinkle with optional sugar. Bake 15-17 minutes, or until scones are lightly golden brown. Allow to cool to room temperature before eating. Best enjoyed within 3 days after keeping in an airtight container.
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Julia Child’s Poached Pear Tart

This week, pie is all over the social media feeds. “To bake, or not to bake” seems to be a pertinent question this year–and for those who are paring down on the festivities, this question comes into even more glaring focus. I’ve seen suggestions for hand pies, or lemon bars, as supplicant solutions to the pie dilemma. While these tasty baked treats would be a welcome addition to any day of the year, they don’t exactly scream “special occasion.” Enter an alternative to the alternatives: Julia Child’s poached pear tart. With three distinct steps, a few hours of work, and a decorative topping as ornate as one has the patience to craft, this tart can be a real showstopper–and it tastes amazing~

Musky, nutty, creamy, and sweet: one forkful and you might even forget it’s the weirdest holiday season ever.

This recipe is a good exercise in some traditional culinary skills, and presents a good challenge to continue ones quarantined gastronomic exploits. If you’ve never tried a Julia Child recipe before, this is a great one to start with! So make it, and impress your loved ones. Or better yet, rope them into the process too. There are plenty of opportunities to sneak sweet bites in between steps…

Julia Child’s Poached Pear Tart

To begin with, I made the sugar crust and let it chill for an hour. As it firmed up in the fridge, I made the almond paste.

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frangipane ingredients

Julia instructs us to beat the eggs and sugar until very pale yellow and forming ribbons, about to this stage:

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as you can see i beat this by hand, but feel free to use and electric or stand mixer if that’s what makes you happy : )

(I did deviate slightly from her directions as I added a pinch of salt to the mix as well, but this is a matter of personal preference.)

As the frangipane cooled, I pealed, stemmed, and cored the pears, then simmered in wine, lemon juice, cinnamon, and sugar for 8 minutes.

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before
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afterwards I used quince jelly because I had it, but the original recipe calls for red currant.

By this stage, the dough is ready to be rolled out and baked, and the tart assembled. Traditionally, the pears are cut in thin slices widthwise and laid in a circular tart in concentric circles, maintaining the suggestion of their original pear shape. Since this year has been anything but traditional, I decided to mix things up a bit and change the shape from a circle to a rectangle, and lay the slices in a different pattern. My goal was to achieve a more even distribution of pear, so that every slice is guaranteed a generous portion of fruit.

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are you enticed yet? : )
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Julia Child’s Poached Pear Tart

Print Recipe Pin Recipe
Prep Time 2 hours 30 minutes
Cook Time 20 minutes
Total Time 2 hours 50 minutes
Course Dessert
Cuisine French, traditional

Ingredients
  

Sugar Crust

  • 1 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
  • 7 Tbs granulated sugar
  • 1/8 tsp baking powder
  • 7 Tbs chilled butter
  • 1 egg, beaten with 1 tsp water
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Frangipane

  • 1/2 cup almonds
  • 1 egg, large
  • 1 egg yolk
  • 3/4 cup granulated sugar
  • 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1 cup whole milk
  • 3 Tbs butter
  • 2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1/4 tsp almond extract

Poached Pears

  • 6 pears, ripe but still firm
  • 2 cups red wine
  • 2 Tbs fresh squeezed lemon juice
  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/4 cup red currant jelly (or other preserves with mild flavor)

Instructions
 

Sugar Crust

  • Whisk together dry ingredients. Cut in butter using a pastry cutter or food processor until it resembles small, uniform crumbs. Add egg and vanilla until combined, flatten into a disk, wrap in plastic wrap, and chill for 1 hour.
  • Preheat oven to 375°F.
  • On a floured surface, roll dough out to about 1/8th of an inch thick. Transfer dough to the tart pan, crimping or pressing the edges with a fork if desired.
  • Line tart with foil and fill with pie weights, or dried beans or rice. Bake 9-10 minutes, or until pastry is set and the top of the crust has begun to change from shiny in appearance to matte. Bake 7-10 minutes more, or until crust is lightly browned and cooked all the way through. Let cool completely on a wire rack.

Frangipane

  • Preheat oven to 350°F. Spread almonds in a single layer on a baking sheet and bake for 10 minutes, taking care not to burn them. Blend in a food processor or blender until they are pulverized into small, homogenous chunks.
  • Whisk egg and egg yolk in a large mixing bowl until combined, then gradually add sugar, whisking as you do so. Mixture should grow paler and paler yellow, and grow shiny after about 3 minutes. Thin ribbons should form from the end of your whisk or electric beater when held about a foot above the bowl, about five minutes. Add flour and combine.
  • Heat milk in a medium saucepan on the stove until simmering. Add a few tablespoons to the egg mixture, and whisk to temper the milk into the eggs. Gradually add the rest of the milk, whisking as you do so. (Do not rush this process or you might end up with scrambled eggs!)
  • Place milk and egg mixture back in the saucepan over medium heat, whisking continuously 3-5 minutes. Remove from heat and add pulverized almonds, vanilla and almond extracts, and butter. Let cool completely, covering custard with buttered parchment paper to prevent a skin from forming.

Poached Pears

  • Bring wine, lemon juice, sugar, and cinnamon to a boil in a medium saucepan on the stove.
  • Peel, stem, and core the pears. Drop pears into the boiling wine and cook 8-10 minutes, until stained and seasoned, but still firm enough to retain their shape. Turn off the heat and let the pears steep for 20 minutes in the liquid, then place pears on a wire rack to drain.
  • Place the wine solution over high heat until it is at 230°F, then add jelly. Once the preserves have dissolved and the mixture coats the back of a spoon, remove from heat and let cool.

Tart Assembly

  • Brush the bottom of the baked tart shell with the reduced wine/jelly mixture. Fill shell with frangipane, and smooth with a spatula. Cut pears into 1/4 inch thick slices and arrange atop the frangipane. If desired, brush pears with more jelly mixture. Chill before serving.
  • Keeps up to 5 days in the fridge.
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Dorie Greenspan’s Baked Apples

I rarely come across a recipe that I don’t adapt in the kitchen. Few and far between are the chefs I trust implicitly enough to blindly follow a recipe for the first time. Dorie Greenspan is one of those chefs. If you’re looking for a unique, fall-flavored treat, you have to try Dorie Greenspan’s baked apples stuffed with candied ginger and dried apple chips!

My sister recently learned that she is intolerant to gluten. Rather than shower her in gluten-free approximations of traditional sweet treats, I decided to get a little creative (and a little seasonal) and see what the internet had to offer on the happenstantially-gluten-free-dessert front. (Thank you, internet, for always providing me with what I seek!)

The only modification I made to this recipe was the kind of apple I baked. Dorie recommends large baking apples (Rome Beauty, to be precise) but I had these smaller, Opal apples on hand which still tasted beautiful baked–I found the portion size for a smaller apple to be closer to what I could comfortably eat as well. (Sorry Dorie, for the slight deviation…)

Dorie Greenspan’s Baked Apples

Everything else about this recipe I followed to the letter, and was so pleased with the results. I’d never made baked apples (somehow!) and was frankly delighted with the whole process. Coring and stuffing the apples, basting them in high-quality pressed cider and butter, watching them puff and brown in the oven…the whole experience was part of the treat of eating them. To boot, this recipe is grain-free and refined-sugar-free, so flavorful, and feels so perfectly autumnal. The real sense of indulgence comes from the butter and whipped cream, which are beautifully complimented by the sharpness of the apple and the warmth of the candied ginger. I mean it when I tell you this recipe left a profound enough impression on me, it will probably become a yearly staple…and I’m sure I’ll make it again before fall is gone.

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the top right bowl contains raisins

There was definitely a steep learning curve in terms of coring the apples without an apple core-er. I used this cheese knife to pierce concentrically around the core, then used a small spoon to scoop out the flesh I’d serrated–a labor intensive process, but so rewarding. These apples are cute as a button when they’re all hollowed out with little lids for the top!

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dorie recommends peeling away the topmost layer of apple skin and leaving the rest; this has the effect of adding a note of gastronomy to this simple and homey dessert!
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the apples were stuffed with dried apple chunks, unsweetened raisins, and candied ginger, then topped with a generous pat of butter!

Apple cider and honey go into the pie dish and the whole thing bakes for about an hour, until…

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my frankenstiened toothpick apple exploded, but that’s ok! the innards flavored the basting liquid and it still tasted delicious

I basted the apples three times over the course of the hour, spooning buttery cider into the hollowed cavity and over the tops of the apples.

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apple cross section–don’t forget the whipped cream!!
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serve with maple-syrup sweetened whipped cream, a dash of cinnamon, and buttery cider juices from the bottom of the pie dish. YUM.

Dorie Greenspan’s Baked Apples

Serves 4-6

Apples

  • 4 large apples or 6 medium ones
  • ½ lemon, cut into wedges
  • ¼ c dried apple rings, broken into small chunks
  • 4 pieces of crystallized ginger
  • 1/4 c raisins
  • 2 teaspoons honey per apple, + 2 more tsp for basting liquid
  • 3 Tbs butter
  • 1 cup pressed apple cider

Topping

  • ½ c heavy whipping cream
  • 1 1/2 Tbs maple syrup
  • Dash of cinnamon

Preheat oven to 375 and make sure a rack is centered in the oven. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or foil, and place a 9” pie dish on top.

Cut a small cap off the top of each apple, and keep it close to its mate so they don’t get confused. Use a small paring knife or corer to remove the core from the apples. (Note: sometimes perforating the apple flesh with a fork or cheese knife makes for easier work.) Peel the topmost layer of apple skin underneath the cap of each apple and reserve. Rub the peeled and cored apple flesh with lemon and squeeze some juice into each opening.

In a small bowl, combine equal parts ginger, dried apple chunks, and raisins to make the filling. Press down into the opening of each apple, and drizzle 2 tsp honey into each apple. Cut the butter into as many chunks as you have apples, and place each pat over the top of the cavity. Pop the lid back on the apple, and don’t worry if it feels very full!

Pour cider into the pie dish and mix in 2 tsp honey, two lemon wedges, and reserved apple peelings. (Chef’s note: the honey won’t dissolve evenly into the cider at first, but don’t fret!)

Arrange the apples in the pie dish and bake.

Baste the apples occasionally with the liquid from the pie dish as they bake, at least three times. When you can poke them with a fork and meet minimal resistance, 50-70 minutes, they are done. 

Let them cool for about 15 minutes as you prepare the whipped cream.

Add cream and maple syrup to a medium bowl with high walls, or a large bowl. Beat with an electric beater until fluffy and of desired texture, about 5 minutes.

When the apples have cooled slightly, top with whipped cream and a dusting of cinnamon. 

These apples keep 2 days in the refrigerator and can be reheated in the microwave.