Ask a Chef reveals the secrets of those superb dishes you ate in cafes and restaurants and wanted to try making.
Alibi's pear and apple crumble
Ingredients
1.5kg apples, peeled and sliced
2 cinnamon sticks
100g caster sugar
1kg pears, peeled and sliced
1 vanilla pod
60ml white wine
Crumble topping
20g brown sugar
300g butter
450g flour
450g roughly ground almonds
Method
Put the apples in a pot with cinnamon sticks and sugar and put over low heat until the juice runs. Cook until soft, then add sliced pears, the vanilla pod and white wine. Cook until the fruit is soft. The fruit can be prepared ahead and refrigerated.
To make topping, rub the butter into the flour then stir in the sugar and ground almonds.
Put the fruit in a baking dish and spread topping over. Bake at 160degC for 10-16 minutes until fruit is hot and topping is cooked.
Serve with ice cream or cream.
Requested by Tanya Dobson of Invercargill.
Recipe supplied by Kurt Hoffman, head chef at Alibi Bar and Cafe in the Octagon, Dunedin.
• If you have enjoyed a dish in an Otago cafe or restaurant and would like the recipe, write to Ask a Chef, Features, Otago Daily Times, PO Box 181, Dunedin, fax 474-7422, or email odt.features@odt.co.nz, including your name, address and a daytime telephone number, and we will request it.
