A froise you say? I’m sure you make them all the time and the word just trips off your tongue into your menu repertoire. Or if you’re anything like me, you’d never heard of it until very recently.
I’ve been loving Rachel Kelly aka The Dinner Doctor‘s series at the Guardian on how to use up leftovers and under her recent column on milk was a froise. I clicked through to her blog and saw that it’s a traditional British dish using a souffle enriched batter to make a layered pancake. Rachel made her version with bacon and it sounded amazing.
In fact it sounded so amazing and easy that it went to the very top of my ‘to make soon’ list (an evergrowing Evernote folder actually). Except that when I came to acquaint myself finally with the froise I didn’t have any bacon, but I did have two pounds of cherries. It’s not often you can substitute cherries for bacon, but one of the very best things about pancakes is that they often work as well as a sweet dish as a savoury one so I decided to make it a dessert dish instead.
My first attempt was on the hob and I found my froise too thin for the chunkier cherry filling and the bottom burned while the top took so long to cook the whole thing was slightly rubbery in texture. It had plenty of potential and flavour so I decided on a wet Sunday afternoon to give it another go. This time I doubled the proportions of the batter, macerated the cherries for added sweetness, allowed the butter to brown gently for extra flavour and baked it all in the oven and it came together perfectly.
Cherry Brown Butter Froise (serves 4 with extra fruit or creme fraiche)
- 250g fresh cherries
- 2 tablespoons sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 25g salted butter
- 100g plain flour (I suspect you could use spelt here if wheat free)
- 2 egg yolks
- 300ml milk
- 2 egg whites
- 3 drops almond extract (optional)
- 1 tablespoon pearl sugar (optional)
Start the dish with your cherries. I used fresh ones because one of my local stalls is selling them for £1.50 per pound weight but you could use defrosted frozen ones or if you can get your hands on them from a Polish shop or Lidl or Aldi, some jarred sour Morello ones.
Stone the fresh ones. I simply split mine in two and squeezed the stone out which was surprisingly quick. Put the halved cherries in a shallow dish and scatter with the sugar and vanilla extract. Allow to sit for at least 30 minutes or up to 2 hours until the fruit softens and takes on the additional flavours.
Using a cast iron or oven proof frying pan, gently heat the butter on a medium heat, allowing it to foam up and keep cooking to the point where the milk solids start to caramelise gently. Mine took about 10 minutes and once it started to foam and bubble, I watched it like a hawk because brown butter or buerre noisette is glorious, but burnt butter is not.
While the butter browns, preheat the oven to 200℃ and put the flour, egg yolks and milk into a large bowl and combine well with an electric whisk. Clean the beaters well and whisk the egg whites until stiff. You could add another tablespoon of sugar halfway through if you are using sour cherries. Add the beaten egg white into the batter and whisk together quickly. It will be pale, golden and puffed right up. Add the almond extract if liked.
As soon as the butter browns and smells nutty, pour in half the froise mixture. The residual heat of the pan and the butter will allow it to cook just slightly so the base sets gently without the dreaded burn. Pour any liquid off the macerated cherries into the remaing froise batter and layer the cherries over the froise in the pan. Try and keep them as a single layer so they don’t drop down and sink.
Pour the remaining batter over it all and then sprinkle with the pearl sugar. I forgot it the second time and it still tasted great but I missed the contrasting crunch. Bake the froise in the oven for 30 minutes. It will puff up and become a glorious toasted colour on top. Loosen the edges of it as soon as it leaves the oven and allow to cool in the pan for at least 10 minutes.
You can serve it warm from the pan at this stage or allow it to cool in there completely before being lifted out and served cold in wedges. It keeps well for up to 2 days, wrapped in a tea towel and makes a great packed lunch or picnic dish. This made a welcome change from the frittatas I make when I want to make a filling breakfast ahead of time and is a great way to use up slightly drooping fruit or savoury leftovers such as potatoes or roast meat. It’s made a swift move into my ‘dishes I love’ folder in no time.
PS: my dad emailed to say he knew this dish from his Scottish childhood as an Ashet pancake, derived from the French word for dish ‘assiette’. It would have been savoury and served with a small limp 1950s salad. He preferred the brown butter.
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