A chocolate cherry clafoutis eats just as elegant, luscious and sophisticated as it sounds. It’s stone fruit season and I’ve been bingeing on darkly delicious cherries, which are at the cheapest right now. Apricots, plums, nectarines are filling fruit stalls now, jostling with mangoes, watermelons, litchis and melons. The abundance of fruit is my silver lining this scorching summer.
What is a clafoutis?
Trust the French to make even a rustic dish elegant. A clafoutis (pronounced kla-foo-tee) is a simple dessert of (usually unpitted) black cherries ensconced in a custard-like mixture of milk/cream, eggs, cinnamon and a little flour in a buttered dish and baked. The dish hails from Limousin in southern France. A clafoutis can also be made with apples, plums, blueberries, apricots, nectarines, pears, strawberries and most other berries.
My chocolate cherry clafoutis is what you could term a richer, celebratory, party version because it has dark chocolate. If you have a love for dark chocolate like me, then the feeling of biting into the magma of velvety, smooth chocolate dotted with ripe and juicy cherries, is something worth experiencing. The best thing about the chocolate cherry clafoutis is that the recipe is unfussy and easy, it has no added sugar and is ready before you can say”clafoutis”. Clafoutis recipes do have sugar in the recipe but I chose to skip it because the cherries were really sweet and even dark chocolate I used (Amul Dark Chocolate) is slightly sweet, which was the perfect amount for me.
Bake a perfect chocolate cherry clafoutis
- Pick the best fruit – ripe yet firm with no brown marks or squishy parts. Watery fruit are a no-no.
- Traditional clafoutis is made with unpitted cherries. Removing the seed can make the fruit mushy, allowing the juice to run and it won’t hold its shape. Also, the cherry seed imparts a light almondy flavour to the dish. While eating, just remember not to bit down hard on the cherries.
- Use good quality dark chocolate.
- Don’t overbake the clafoutis, it can become dry and rubbery.
And that’s all there is to baking a clafoutis. This summer, use the bounty of cherrie / stone fruit to make a chocolate cherry clafoutis that is guaranteed to impress friends and family.
Chocolate Cherry Clafoutis
Ingredients
- 450 g ripe, firm, black cherries, washed, stalks removed
- 250 g dark chocolate, chopped
- 50 g all-purpose flour
- 4 eggs
- 200 ml milk
- 60 ml light cream (25% fat)
- 1 tsp cinnamon powder
- A little butter to grease the baking dish.
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180°C and lightly butter a 1.5ltr glass or ceramic baking dish.
- Melt the chopped dark chocolate in a heatproof bowl placed over (not in) a pan of barely simmering water. The surface of the water must not touch the bowl of chocolate. Allow the melted chocolate to come to lukewarm temperature.
- In another bowl, whisk the flour, salt and ground cinnamon together.
- Whisk the milk, cream and eggs together and add to the flour to make a smooth batter.
- Mix in the meted chocolate and pour the batter into the buttered dish. Scatter the cherries all over, evenly over the custard. They will partially sink.
- Bake the clafoutis in the preheated oven for 20 minutes, cool completely and chill in the fridge before serving.
4 Comments
Bhargavi
June 15, 2022 at 1:30 pmWow that’s one of the best descriptions I have enjoyed reading ! Velvety magma will definitely be tried ! And will share the photo if possible. Thank you Supriya!
quichentell
June 27, 2022 at 12:31 pm😀 you’re most welcome Bhagi!
Chris David
June 28, 2022 at 1:36 pmI loved this recipe so much . It’s really awesome
quichentell
July 7, 2022 at 12:11 pmThank you Chris 🙂