Zabaglione is my perfect pudding. You have to make it moments before serving it and it is rich and warm, with just the right amount of sweetness. The frothy intensity of sweetened egg yolks is balanced beautifully when you add the bitterness of alcohol. In Italy, it is traditionally made with Marsala. Moscato D’Asti – the lightly sparkling Italian sweet wine – makes another great choice. This week, I wanted to show you two different methods for making and serving this luscious treat, both utilising the forager’s favourite fleeting June offering: elderflower.
Some years ago, my friends Stevie Parle and Joseph Trivelli held a supper club at Leila’s Shop in east London. Both of them had spent years working together at London’s legendary River Cafe (Joseph is now co-chef there). It was a particularly balmy June evening and – as is often the way with chefs – they had been slightly over-ambitious with their menu. The plan was to be well prepped in the morning, head over to meet me in the afternoon on the edge of the Walthamstow marshes and spend an hour or so foraging elderflowers for their starter that evening. When the call came (somewhat expectedly) that they were running short on time, my husband and I happily volunteered to go out picking on our own and bring the blossoms along to the meal.
We arrived at the supper just as the clinking of glasses and hum of a happy crowd had begun. I passed the just-picked flowers to them through the open kitchen, where they were immediately battered and fried and served with a garlicky aioli. I was so struck by the beautiful contrast of light and rich and salt and sweet that the moment was cemented forever in my conceptual culinary scrapbook.
Since then I have been dreaming of a version with a sort of sweet mayonnaise dip, one that has the salt and sweet and rich and light juxtapositions, but for the end of the meal rather than the beginning.
My other zabaglione recipe this week has a slightly different method and is finished off under the grill. Either way, both preparations with the use of sweet wines go beautifully with summer elderflower. So, go out into the sweet and rainy June air to forage and find out for yourself.
Elderflower fritters with zabaglione
Serves 6
For the fritters
200g plain flour
2 tbsp cornflour
150-200g ice water
12 full heads of elderflower
For the zabaglione
160g Moscato d’Asti or other sweet white wine
6 tbsp caster sugar
8 large egg yolks
Salt
Ice (for water bath)
1 First, make the fritters. Heat the oil to 180C/350F in a dutch oven, heavy pot, or deep-fat fryer.
2 Whisk the flours together, then drizzle in a little of the ice water to form a paste. Add the remaining water up to 150g, whisking well. Dip a finger into the batter and it should coat it, but the definition of your fingertip and nail should be visible through the batter. If it is too thick, whisk in a bit more water.
3 Dip the elderflower heads into the batter, holding the stem. Lower the heads down into the fat, holding them there for a moment so that the flower opens up and then you can let go. Repeat with all of the heads. This is a good thing to do with a friend or another cook so that one of you can make the zabaglione while the other fries the heads. If you are on your own, put the fried elderflowers on a paper towel-lined plate in a warm oven until ready to serve, but leave them no longer than an hour.
4 Then make the zabaglione. Set up an ice bath in a large bowl and place a smaller heatproof bowl inside it (glass or stainless steel is ideal).
5 Heat the wine with half of the sugar in a saucepan over a medium heat until it starts to simmer.
6 With an electric whisk or stand mixer with the whisk attachment, whip up the egg yolks with the remaining sugar until pale and holding ribbon shapes when the whisk is lifted out of them.
7 Temper the yolks by pouring a little of the warm wine in and whisking well, then return that mixture back into the remaining wine in the pot and return to the heat. When a thin skin starts to form on the bottom of the pan, quickly pour the mixture out into your prepared bowl over the ice bath. Whisk vigorously until it has cooled down. Serve at once with the freshly fried fritters and a sprinkle of flaky sea salt.
Baked zabaglione with elderflower and fresh strawberries (pictured main)
Serves 4
500g fresh strawberries
4 tbsp muscat wine (Beaumes de Venise or other sweet white wine)
6 tbsp caster sugar
6 large egg yolks
3-4 elderflower heads
1 Hull the strawberries and cut into quarters. Set aside. Heat the grill.
2 Heat the muscat and half the sugar in a small, heavy-bottomed saucepan until it loses half its volume.
3 Put the yolks and the remaining sugar in a bowl. Whisk until pale and holding ribbon shapes when the whisk is lifted out of them. Temper the egg yolks with the muscat mixture in a heatproof bowl over barely simmering water. Whisk until the mixture is beginning to thicken and is light and foamy.
4 Pour the mix into a medium-sized gratin dish and drop the strawberries on top along with the picked flowers of one head of elderberry.
5 Place under the grill for a couple of minutes to brown, then sprinkle the top with more flowers. The heat from the pudding sets off the fragrance in the flowers. Serve at once.
