Peach Melba

It's almost August and, here in WV,  it's PEACH SEASON.  One of our local orchards has a great little farmer's market, Orr's.  The peaches are piled in baskets, the counters are full of berries (I bought some red raspberries) and fresh veggies and flowers are everywhere.  You can cut or pick your own of some of their products.  We've been waiting for the first cling-free peaches to come in. These are Sunbrights. 

It's hard to put peaches this fresh and sweet in a dough.  After just eating them fresh for a couple days, I decided to go to an old recipe from the turn of the century that we used to make in the 70's--Peach Melba.  If you make this, PLEASE try it with the peaches warm before you put them in the fridge to serve later.  (Or reheat the peaches in the microwave before serving.)  The warm peach contrasted with the chilled ice cream perfectly and made the raspberry sauce taste bright and fresh.

PEACH MELBA

Red Raspberry Sauce:

2 cups fresh red raspberries (Save a few fresh berries to put on top)

1/4 cup sugar

1 Tablespoon lemon juice

Process this mixture in a blender until pureed.  Pour into a fine-meshed strainer and press through to remove the seeds.  Cover the puree and refrigerate until needed.

Peaches:

3 large ripe peaches, peeled and split with seeds removed

2 cups sugar

2 cups water

To make the peaches easier to peel, you may immerse them in boiling water for about 30 seconds and then plunge into ice water to loosen the skin.

Bring the sugar and water to a boil and simmer about 5 minutes.  Add the clean peaches and boil gently about 7-8 minutes.  Remove from heat and allow to cool to a very warm temperature.

Vanilla Ice Cream:

Buy good quality vanilla ice cream or here's a good creamy version if you want to make your own.

Amaretti Cookies:

Crumble cookies to use as topping--one cookie per serving.

To put together the dessert, place one very warm peach in a dish.  Scoop vanilla ice cream over the peach.  Drizzle with fresh raspberry sauce and crumble an amaretti cookie on top.   Sprinkle with a couple fresh raspberries on top.