Panna ‘Ri-cotta’

Name: Panna ‘Ri-cotta’
Yield: Serves 4
Ingredients: 350 g (12 oz) fresh apricots, stoned & sliced; Juice of ½ lemon; 100 ml (3½ fl oz, ½ cup) freshly made strong coffee, preferably espresso; 4 (5) tablespoons milk; Zest of ½ orange; 2 gelatine leaves; 150 ml (1/4 pint, ½ cup) double cream; 75 g (3 oz, scant ½ cup) caster sugar; 2 tablespoons rum; ½ vanilla pod, split; Sprigs of fresh mint, to decorate (optional); 200 g (7 oz, scant 1 cup) firm ricotta, sieved; 90 ml (3 fl oz, ⅓ cup) water

Preparation info

Serves
4

Difficulty
Medium

Appears in

A Passion for Cheese

By Paul Gayler

Published 1997

About

Panna cotta, meaning cooked cream, is a traditional Piedmontese pudding of moulded cream lightly set with gelatine. Unconventionally, this recipe includes ricotta, so I have christened it Panna ‘Ri-cotta’ Moving even further away from tradition, it is flavoured with coffee and served with afresh apricot compote.

Ingredients

4 (5) tablespoons milk
150 ml (1/4 pint, ½

Dessert
Vegetarian
Gluten-free

Method

Put the milk, cream, sugar and orange zest in a pan and bring to the boil. Stir in the coffee and scrape in the seeds from the vanilla pod, then add the pod as well. Remove from the heat and leave to cool. Meanwhile, put the gelatine in a small pan, cover with cold water and leave to soak for 5 minutes. Heat gently until the gelatine has dissolved.

Take the vanilla pod out of the pan an