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15th July 2020

While Wimbledon may have been off the cards this year, Head Chef, Ian Howard shows how to utlise his favourite summer flavour combination – strawberries and cream – to serve up something special. A real nod to sun drenched days, his Strawberry bavaroise with almond coral sponge and lemon curd is reminiscent of childhood summers – just with a sophisticated grown up edge.

Ingredients

For the bavaroise
1kg strawberries blitzed into a fine puree
10ml lemon juice
Lemon zest
80g castor sugar
100ml luke warm water
8 gelatin leaves
450 ml cream (semi-whipped)

For the almond sponge
150g egg whites
80g ground almonds
80g sugar
30g plain flour
60g egg yolk

To garnish
Lemon curd
Fresh English strawberries
A handful of toasted flaked almonds
A handful of finely sliced mint leaves

Method

For the Bavaroise:

Make a strawberry puree but heating the blitzed strawberries, lemon juice, zest and sugar, before leaving to to cool slightly.
Dissolve the gelatine by placing it in the warm water and stirring until completely dissolved.
Set aside a small amount of strawberry puree to be used as garnish.
Combine the gelatine mix with the remaining puree, Strain into a bowl set over ice.
Once the mix has semi-set and it is firm to touch, fold in the semi-whipped cream.
Place into your mould and refrigerate till set.
Top tip: When you’re ready to ready to plate, gently warm the mould slightly to release the bavaroise with ease.

For the almond coral sponge:

Mix all the ingredients in a blender until smooth.
Sieve and then pour into a half-litre siphon.
Aerate with 2 whipping cream chargers (N2O)
Spray the mixture into a paper coffee cup in which a hole has been made in the bottom. Fill the cups no more than half-full.
Place in the microwave at full power for 30-40 seconds.
Allow to cool upside down.
If you don’t have all the utensils to create the sponge, shortbread or tuille biscuits are a good alternative replacement.

To plate, top a slice of the bavaroise with a piece of almond sponge. Dot drips of lemon curd and strawberry puree alternately around the plate before garnishing with fresh English strawberries, toasted flaked almonds and chopped mint.