I’ve been researching cooking with leaves for years. Fig leaves, vine leaves, geranium leaves.
A few years ago the founder of Toast, Jessica Seaton, wrote a cookbook ‘Gather, cook, feast’ in conjunction with Anna Colquhoun, containing an interesting recipe using blackcurrant leaves.
Don’t get confused between blackberries and blackcurrants (like I do). Blackcurrant leaves, like many other plants, have a faint flavour of the fruit.
This is a recipe that requires forward planning! Last year I bought two blackcurrant plants. This spring I finally had some leaves to pick, young tender ones.
The result was a subtly flavoured cream, with a hint of Ribena. My daughter found the taste disturbing as it had a greenness, a vegetal freshness. I liked it, but wonder how to squeeze more flavour from the leaf.
Blackcurrant leaf cream
Ingredients
- handful fresh tender blackcurrant leaves
- 500 ml double cream
- 100 ml whole milk
- 1/2 tsp vanilla paste or a vanilla pod
- 50 g sugar
- 3.5 silver gelatine leaves
Instructions
- Scrunch up the leaves and add to the cream and milk mixture. Add the vanilla. Cover the bowl and leave overnight in the fridge.
- Soak the gelatine leaves in cold water until soft.
- Heat up the cream and milk mixture and add the sugar until melted. Remove, squeezing out the cream, the leaves. Split and scrape the vanilla pod if using. . Let it cool slightly then stir in the gelatine.
- Put into ramekins or small containers and leave until cool. I decorated the top with a small blackcurrant leaf. Then transfer to the fridge.
- Serve cold with a blackcurrant or blackberry compote.
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