Quinces are cooked with honey and a little ginger in a modern interpretation of a very old way of preserving the fruit. It is lovely with scones, on porridge, or on top of these light, fluffy pikelet ‘pancakes’ for breakfast or an afternoon snack.
Servings: 400g quince honey; 16-20 pikelets (enough for 4 people)
3 quinces
120ml runny honey
½ tsp ground ginger
25g unsalted butter
180g plain flour
250ml buttermilk
1 egg
pinch of salt
25g caster sugar
zest of an orange
3/4tsp ground cloves
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
butter or rapeseed oil (for cooking the pikelets)
2 tbsp icing sugar
To make the quince honey:
Scrub the quinces under cold water. Cut each quince into quarters, remove the core, cut into chunks and as you work put each piece into a bowl of cold water. Once all done lift the quince out of the water and put into a medium saucepan with 200ml water. Partially cover and simmer for 10 mins until very tender.
Lift the fruit out of the liquid, and mash until smooth. Return the fruit to the pan with the cooking liquid, then stir in the honey and the ground ginger. Simmer genttly for 10 mins, stirring frequently. Set aside to cool. The quince honey can be used straight away, or stored in the fridge in a sterilised container for 10 days.
To make the orange and clove pikelets:
Melt the butter and set aside to cool. Sift the flour into a large mixing bowl then whisk in the buttermilk, egg, salt and sugar. Add the orange zest and the ground cloves; then lastly the melted butter.
When you are ready to make the pancakes, mix the bicarbonate of soda into the batter. Melt a small piece of butter or a little oil in a large frying pan then place in four separate spoonfuls of batter approx 10cm across. When you start to see bubbles coming up turn the pikelets over to brown on the other side.
Keep the cooked pikelets warm while you quickly wipe the base of the pan and repeat the process.
To serve: top each pikelet with quince honey and a light dusting of icing sugar.
(This recipe originally featured for Borough Market.)