When Life Gives You Rotten Nectarines

Pistachio and almond crumble, poached apples, buttermilk sponge cake and spiced mascarpone cream

I walked into Whole Foods on Monday and I saw a beautiful display of white peaches, nectarines and plums of different kinds that really caught my son’s eye. He loves peaches so he immediately wanted me to get him one. I looked at the label and they were “conventional” from Chile. Here we go again with the Chilean fruit. He kept insisting and pointing at the peaches, so to make peace, I put four in a bag and walked away.

While I was driving home, I was thinking what to make with them since I always think about how I can turn anything and everything into a sweet treat. Suddenly I had a flash back to May of 2003 when I did a food tasting as part of my job interview. I had to make two plated desserts and a birthday cake in 3 hours. One of the desserts had to be fruit and the other chocolate. I made a beautiful chocolate pot de creme and a layered nectarine and mascarpone crumble. So while I was driving home I thought, “why not tweak that dessert you made five years ago?”. That was my plan.

We ate lunch, I put my son down for his nap and planned on starting to make the different components for the dessert. I had some crumble in the freezer and I used some of the leftover cake that I baked for the Daring Bakers challenge. That’s how I function. I bake and freeze, bake and freeze.

So I baked the pistachio crumble, cut the cake, whipped the mascarpone cream and when I went to cut the nectarines… Well, you guessed it… they were rotten! Brown, grainy and sandy nectarines. I knew it! It happens every time I try to break the seasonality rules. I deserve the punishment.

So I looked in my fruit basket, saw that I had some golden delicious apples and decided to use them instead. My executive pastry chef and friend Sebastien Thieffine won best plated dessert title at the 2004 Bread and Pastry Championship with a lovely apple and almond dessert. His dessert had a hazelnut streusel bottom, poached apples, citrus pain de genes, champagne sabayon, creme brulee and green apple ice cream. It was magnificent to say the least. I really loved his technique to poach the apples so I decided to go ahead and use it here.

Pistachio Crumble



100 grams unsalted butter

100 grams sugar

100 grams flour

125 grams pistachios, chopped

pinch of salt



Cream all ingredients together in an electric mixer. It will be crumbly. Place on a cookie sheet or in an air tight container and refrigerate over night. I normally make a large batch and freeze it and then I bake what I need.

Bake in a 350 degree oven for about 10 minutes until it is golden brown. When cool, break into small pieces.

Spiced Mascarpone Cream

60 grams organic heavy cream

60 grams mascarpone cheese

15 grams sugar

1/2 tsp cinnamon

Pinch of mace

Whip all ingredients together to semi stiff peak, just like whipped cream.

Buttermilk Cake

adapted from Dorie Greenspan

2 1/4 cups cake flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

1 ¼ cups whole milk or buttermilk (I prefer buttermilk with the lemon)

4 large egg whites

1 ½ cups sugar

2 teaspoons grated lemon zest

1 stick (8 tablespoons or 4 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature

½ teaspoon pure lemon extract



Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt. Whisk together the milk and egg whites in a medium bowl. Put the sugar and lemon zest in a mixer bowl or another large bowl and rub them together with your fingers until the sugar is moist and fragrant. Add the butter and working with the paddle or whisk attachment, or with a hand mixer, beat at medium speed for a full 3 minutes, until the butter and sugar are very light.

Beat in the extract, then add one third of the flour mixture, still beating on medium speed. Beat in half of the milk-egg mixture, then beat in half of the remaining dry ingredients until incorporated.

Divide the batter into 3 6-inch pans and bake at 350 degrees. To check if they are done, insert a toothpick in the center of the cake and if it comes out clean, it is done.

Let the cake cool and with a cookie cutter the same size as your ring mold, cut cake circles. Then cut these circles horizontally into three.

Assemble the Dessert

Place a metal ring on top of the dessert plate. Press the crumble into the bottom of the metal ring. We want an even, thin layer. Spoon the drained apples on top and apply some pressure on top with a small spoon. Keep even layers. Lift up the metal ring carefully so we have the crumble and the apples on the plate in a circle.

Place a disk of buttermilk cake on top. Dust powdered sugar on top and finish with some mascarpone cream. As decoration, I rolled a dried vanilla been in granulated sugar.

The nectarines that ended up in the garbage