Angela Hartnett’s Poached Apricots with Whipped Vanilla Ricotta

Jump to Recipe

Soft, sweet apricots poached in vanilla syrup with hints of clove and star anise, served on a smooth, silky bed of whipped ricotta and mascarpone cheese topped with chopped pistachio nuts. This dessert is right up my alley! Wonderfully quick and simple and not over-sweet, this Italian inspired dessert screams summer but can be adapted to suit the seasons by using different fruits, such as plums, peaches and pears. Serve at room temperature on warmer days and with warmed fruit in the colder months.

Where is this recipe from?

This delicious Angela Hartnett recipe can be found in her wonderful cookery book ‘The Weekend Cook’, as well as on the Waitrose website.

However, I first ate it at my friend Mandy’s house: afterwards, I immediately bought the book and re-created this lovely dessert at home. In ‘The Weekend Cook’ Angela Hartnett shares a range of comforting and traditional recipes, suitable for both beginners and experienced home cooks alike.

How to make Angela Hartnett’s Poached Apricots with Vanilla Ricotta

Please see the printable Recipe Card below for the exact, yet condensed, quantities and instructions.

Is this recipe exactly the same as Angela Hartnett’s? Click here to see the original.

I made a couple of minor changes:

• the original recipe uses 300g ricotta and 100g mascarpone. As ricotta tends to be sold in 250g pots in most UK supermarkets, I adjusted the quantities so you only need one pot and balanced it with a little extra mascarpone.
• I reduced the poaching liquor after cooking the fruit. Angela doesn’t do this but I really enjoyed the resulting concentrated flavour and the slightly sticky texture. It does taste sweeter this way though, so I decreased the sugar in the poaching liquor slightly as well.

Collect all the ingredients together:

Apricots –

• vanilla pod (or vanilla paste)
• caster sugar or use granulated
• star anise
• clove
• fresh apricots, or use plums, peaches or pears
• water

Vanilla Ricotta –

• ricotta cheese
• mascarpone cheese. You could also use cream cheese.
• icing sugar
• vanilla seeds from vanilla pod (see above) or use vanilla paste/extract

Serve –

• pistachio nuts, chopped

How to make this wonderful dessert:

1. Poach the apricots: use a sharp knife, carefully slice the vanilla pod lengthways and scrape out the seeds. Save the vanilla seeds for later and put the scraped pod in a saucepan with the sugar, star anise, clove and water. Heat gently until the sugar has dissolved. Stir from time to time.
2. Meanwhile, halve the apricots and remove the stones. Add to the saucepan when the sugar has dissolved and poach on a low to medium heat for 10 minutes, or until soft. Start checking the texture of the apricots after around 5 minutes. Take off the heat and set aside for 10 minutes, although, if you are in a hurry, you can continue with step 3 straight away. Just be very careful as the poaching liquicd will be extremely hot.
3. Gently strain the apricot juice into a saucepan and bring to a rapid simmer. Cook until reduced by two thirds and you have a sweet and sticky syrup. Pour over the apricots and set aside to cool. Discard the vanilla pod, star anise and clove. NB Angela doesn’t actually reduce the syrup, she serves it as it is. Up to you. If you are not going to reduce it, you should add an additional 25g sugar to the poaching syrup at step 1.
4. Vanilla ricotta: weigh the ricotta, mascarpone, icing sugar and vanilla seeds into a mixing bowl and beat with an electric whisk, or balloon whisk, until light and fluffy.
5. Serve the apricots at room temperature on a bed of ricotta cream, drizzled with the apricot syrup and sprinkled with chopped pistachio nuts. You can either serve it on individual plates/dishes or on a large serving bowl and let everyone help themselves.
6. If you are making this in the colder months and using different fruit, such as plums, I would serve them warm, not boiling hot, just comfortably hot.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

Made this recipe?

If you make this recipe, do please tag me on instagram @daffodil_kitchen. You could also leave a comment in the box directly below the recipe.