Oliver Peyton's lemon posset with a blood orange sauce
18.06.09Posset is one of those dishes from our culinary history that has all but disappeared. Sometime in the future it will be popular again, like its foreign relations panna cotta and creme brulee are today, and hopefully this recipe will go some way to making this happen.
Serves four
Ingredients
300ml pouring double cream
75g caster sugar
Finely grated zest of 1 small lemon
2tbsp lemon juice
For the candied orange slices
100g caster sugar
4 paper-thin slices of blood orange,
including the skin
For the blood orange sauce
1 blood orange
30g caster sugar
Method
First make the candied orange slices for the decoration. Put the sugar in a small saucepan with 100ml cold water and bring slowly to the boil, stirring until the sugar has dissolved.
Remove from the heat. Dip the orange slices in the sugar syrup and place on a rack set over a tray. Leave in a warm place, or in an oven that has been heated and turned off, until crisp, which should take about 8 hours.
For the posset, put the cream, sugar and lemon zest in a small saucepan and warm over a low heat, stirring all the time to make sure the sugar dissolves, until bubbles start to form around the edge. Continue cooking gently, without stirring, for about 2 minutes. Do not let the cream get to a rolling boil.
Remove from the heat and stir in the lemon juice until evenly distributed. Pour into four small dessert glasses (about 80ml).
Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours or until set (you can leave the possets in the fridge overnight if this is more convenient).
Make the sauce. Cut the orange into wedges and remove all the pips.
Place the wedges (skin on) in a blender with the sugar and blitz until the sugar has dissolved and the puree is smooth. Pass the sauce through a fine sieve set over a bowl.
Serve each posset topped with a spoonful of the sauce and candied orange slice.
