Peach and honey butter
This is one of my favourite ways to preserve peaches, apricots, nectarines … or any seasonal fruit. The general idea is that you cook a kilogram or so of chopped fruit with some honey, spices and lemon juice, purée it all and then cook the purée so it reduces and thickens to a beautiful butter. It’s amazing on toast, as a cake filling and anywhere else you’d use jam. I love it as a sweet scroll filling, as for the peach scrolls.
Ingredients
- 1 kg 2 lb 4 oz peaches or other stone fruit, chopped
- ¼ cup 90 g honey
- ¼ tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 vanilla bean split lengthways
- A pinch of sea salt
- Juice of 1 lemon
Instructions
- Combine the peaches, honey and cinnamon in a large, deep saucepan.
- Scrape the vanilla seeds into the pan and add the scraped pod.
- Add ¼ cup (60 ml) water and stir well.
- Cook over medium heat for 15 minutes or until the peaches have collapsed completely.
- Discard the vanilla pod, transfer the peach mixture to a blender (or use a stick blender) and blitz to a purée.
- Add the salt and lemon juice, to taste – add a little at a time, testing after each addition until you have the perfect balance of sweetness and acidity.
- Return the purée to the pan and cook over low heat, stirring often, for about 40 minutes or until the mixture thickens and reduces.
- Pour the butter into sterilised jars, seal and refrigerate for 3–4 weeks.
