Fruitful is the title of a new cookbook penned by Sarah Johnson, a brilliant young pastry chef with an impeccable pedigree. Fruitful is a very personal collection of sweet and savoury seasonal recipes inspired by farms, orchards and gardens. It’s packed with suggestions for ways to celebrate the bounty of summer fruits.
There’s an irresistible collection of mouth-watering suppers, salads, elegant cakes and luxurious desserts...
Sarah is American-born but now lives in London. She originally trained with Alice Waters at Chez Panisse in Berkeley in California and currently splits her time between Skye Gyngell’s Spring Restaurant in Somerset House and Heckfield Place, the most gorgeous country house hotel in Hampshire. On her recent visit, she cooked a pop-up dinner at Ballymaloe House and did a guest chef appearance at the Ballymaloe Cookery School.
Both the students and guests loved her, she cooked different dishes for both events using the freshest, most lovely, seasonal ingredients from the farm and gardens. At the cookery school as well as the three recipes I’ve included with this column, she also cooked a frozen yoghurt and honey parfait with roasted blueberries and macerated strawberries and a sublime chocolate tart in a chocolate pastry shell, all of which are in the cookbook as well as a salad of nectarines, green beans, almonds and feta, pan-fried duck breast with blackcurrant, goat cheese soufflés with roasted cherries and a summer herb salad that charmed the.