Spiced Iced Berry Puddings

Berries make an excellent summer dessert. In this recipe a selection of berries are frozen in a mixed spicy rum berry sorbet and served with a delicious coulis. While it may sound complicated it is relatively easy and it has the great advantage that everything can be prepared up to 2 days in advance. Don't throw away soft over ripe berries as they work brilliantly in this recipe.

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6-8 Portions

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Prep: Preparation Time 30 minutes plus 1-2 hours freezing time
Cook: 10 minutes

Ingredients

Berries

200g strawberries
150g raspberries
150g blueberries

Sorbet

200ml sugar syrup
300-350ml berry puree
juice of a a lemon
3 tbsp white rum (optional)

Spiced Sugar Syrup

300g caster sugar
200ml water
1 dried chilli
2 star anise
1 cinnamon stick
2 cm piece of ginger

Mixed Berries

120g strawberries, hulled and cut into 4
60g blueberries
60g raspberries

To Serve

reserved berry syrup
mint leave

Method

Sugar Syrup: Place the sugar in a saucepan with the water and place it over a a low heat. Stir it until the sugar has dissolved.
Add the spices to the pan and bring it to the boil and reduce it to a steady simmer for a couple of minutes. Remove it from the heat and allow it to cool.
Berry Puree: Puree the strawberries and raspberries together and sieve.
Sorbet: Mix the berry puree, lemon juice, rum (optional) and sugar syrup together until well combined. Set anise 100ml of the syrup to serve as a coulis with the sorbet (optional)Pour the mixture into a ice-cream machine and prepare as for manufactures instructions, until it is almost set or place the mixture in a freezer proof container without the lid and place it in a freezer and remove it from the freezer when it is half frozen. Mash and mix it with a fork and place the lid on it and freeze until it until it is almost solid (if you are preparing the sorbet on its own without the whole berries simply freeze it until it is solid).

Iced Berry Puddings

Mix the semi-frozen sorbet with the mixed berries and spoon the mixture into 6-8 dariole moulds or a similar freezer proof container (dependent on size). Cover the moulds with cling film and place them in the freezer until set (1-2 hours). This dessert will keep up to 3 days before serving.
To Serve: Remove the Iced Berry Puddings from the freezer 10-15 minutes before serving. Dip the moulds into hot water briefly and turn the out onto serving plates or bowls (you may need to run a knife around the edge of the mould). Drizzle the berry syrup around the puddings. Garnish each pudding with a mint leaf and serve