Desserts

Well-grown fruit, cultivated for taste and perfume rather than its commercial viability, is truly the ideal dessert—sweet with its own sugars, refreshing and light. There is nothing more beautiful than a still life of fruit with its varied colors and dusting of bloom that shows the fruit is both fresh and unhandled. When it tastes as good as it looks, it is truly exquisite. An excellent piece of fruit can stand entirely on its own or be accompanied by a fresh, delicate cheese; at the beginning of this chapter are suggestions for some particularly appealing seasonal combinations of fruits and fresh cheeses. The work that goes into creating extraordinary fruit is done by the farmer or the gardener. Our main task is the effort of procurement, which is not so easy these days; the usual array of supermarket fruit offers little that resembles the original, even though it looks pretty. Farmers’ markets, U-Picks, and your own garden will be the best sources and worth seeking out. Organically grown fruits, in my experience, have consistently better flavor.