- 500g strawberries, plus four large berries
- A large bunch of basil
- 100g basil dried in an airing cupboard for a couple of days
- a vanilla pod, split lengthways (leave in the seeds
- 100g macadamia nuts
- A small pot of clotted cream
- 400g sugar
- A lemon
- 3g citric acid
- 300g double cream
- 50ml elderflower cordial
- 75g fondant
- 50g glucose
- 5g butter

Roger Hickman
7th January 2015
Strawberry fruit, sorbet and puree, with basil granita, macadamia nuts and elderflower and clotted cream
Strawberry fruit, sorbet and puree, with basil granita, macadamia nuts, and elderflower and clotted cream
Serves 4
Ingredients
Method
Make a smear of clotted cream on each plate, and put one each of the large strawberries on the plate. Roast the macadamia nuts with a little salt in the oven at 180°C for about ten minutes.
When cool, put these on the plates as well.
To make the puree, put the strawberries, four sprigs of basil, and the split vanilla pod in a casserole dish and put in the oven at 180°C for about 20 minutes, stirring half way through.
Allow to cool completely, then add 100g of the sugar.
Blitz in a food processor, and then pass through a fine sieve.
You will need half of the puree to make the sorbet.
Put 150g of sugar in a pan with 300ml water and the juice and zest of one lemon.
Bring to the boil so that the sugar dissolves, and then cool.
Add half of the puree, and then churn in an ice cream maker.
To make the basil granita, blitz the bunch of basil right down.
Now put a litre of water in a pan with 150g sugar and the citric acid, and bring to the boil.
Cool slightly, and then add to the basil, and blitz the whole lot immediately in a food processor.
As soon as you have done that, put the mixture into a shallow container, and put that in a larger container filled with ice and water – you need to cool it rapidly so that you don’t lose the vibrant green colour.
Once it is completely cool, put it in the freezer for eight hours, breaking it up with a fork every couple of hours or so.
Now put a piece of baking parchment over it and put a lid on the container.
For the basil tuiles:
Put the fondant and glucose in a pan with just enough water to cover them.
Heat to 165°C, and then add the butter.
Pour onto a baking mat to cool.
Once it has cooled, blend it together with the dried basil, pass through a sieve, and then sprinkle it through a clean sieve onto another baking mat.
Bake in the oven at 180°C for seven minutes.
Finally, whip the cream into soft peaks, then fold in the elderflower cordial bit by bit until, tasting it until you think it has enough flavour.
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