It's cherry season in North America, which means that stores are chock full of delicious cherries, and many of you have a cherry tree in the yard which is dropping fruit like crazy. (Not me, though - the birds eat all my cherries before I can get to them. Sad!) Because of the way cherry trees produce their fruit, cherries tend to hit the market in one big, short-lived flood, so you want to take advantage of them while they are here.
These delicious fruits are, like so many strongly colored produce items, packed full of nutrition. In addition to being tasty and sweet, cherries carry a significant payload of fiber, potassium, vitamin C, and boron, which is a mineral that can promote bone health by helping your body maintain its calcium balance.
Image courtesy Flickr/D H Wright
The best way to eat cherries, if you ask me, is by the handful. Spit the pits and stems into a bowl, and you're golden. But if you want to cook with cherries, you will probably want to pit them. A cherry pitter can be an invaluable tool, even though I am constitutionally opposed to single-use tools in the kitchen. But if you plan to prepare more than a few cherries, you will find that a cherry pitter can be a lifesaver.
You can also pit cherries with a soda straw, a chopstick, a barbecue skewer, or any other long, narrow tool. (Knitters, a metal DPN works quite well.) When I am pitting for a recipe that requires the cherries to be halved, I like to do it all in one operation. A quick slice along the bottom, then you can scoop out the pit with your thumbnail, and presto: you've got a sliced and pitted cherry in just one movement.
Now what to do with your pitted cherries?
Image courtesy Flickr/jdwheaton
1. Cherry pie
I love a good cherry pie. You can make a pie with either sweet or sour cherries, all you need to do is adjust the amount of sugar that you add. If your cherries are sweet enough, you may not need any sugar at all. Just add a squeeze of lemon and a tablespoon of flour, and you've got yourself a pie filling.
One popular cherry pie variant is the turnover. Just buy pre-made frozen pastry dough at the store, fold it around a dollop of cherry pie filling, and bake according to the directions. I'm getting hungry just thinking about it!
2. Buckle/Cobbler/etc
There is a whole category of desserts that you make in the pan by mixing various forms of dough with cherries. These are easy and delicious. If you don't feel up to spending a lot of time in the kitchen, you can make a darned good cherry cobbler with Bisquick!
3. Dried cherries
Wise Bread suggests preserving your cherries by pitting, halving, and drying them in either a food dehydrator or the oven. They will turn out looking like raisins, and should last reasonably well if you keep them in the fridge. (My experience with home dehydrated foods is that, lacking the preservatives of commercially dehydrated foods, their shelf life is sadly brief.)
4. Cherry muffins and breads
You can take any recipe that calls for blueberries and substitute cherries instead. Cherry muffins are particularly delicious. I like to take the juice that gets left behind in the bowl from pitting, and pour it into the bowl of batter at the very end. It helps add a little more flavor, color, and moistness to the finished product.
5. Cherry clafoutis
Clafoutis is a traditional French dessert which is kind of like a sweet dessert quiche, or a very thick crepe. Clafoutis is perfect if you don't want your dessert to be too sweet, and it is very easy to make. Just mix up the batter, pour it into the pan, and bake as directed. As a bonus, the traditional form of cherry clafoutis calls for cherries with the pits still in, which saves you an extra step.
6. Alcoholic cherries
Commercial maraschino cherries are kind of a nutritional nightmare. You can make your own fairly easily, and as a bonus, they will be delicious! All you have to do is steep your cherries in Maraschino liqueur, and you're ready to go.
Main image courtesy Flickr/sk8geek
1 comments