Salad of fresh white peach, prosciutto and buffalo mozzarella

It's only a few sleeps now before I head off to the Philippines, so I'm feeling desperate to enjoy some food that I know I'll be out of reach for a month. I went for a stroll around Vic Market yesterday to see what looked good and came across some white peaches that reminded me of the salad featured in the Epicure pull-out in The Age this Tuesday.

Bill's Farm could quite possibly be the only delicatessen in Vic Market that will slice you their hams on purchase and don't kick up a fuss about minimum weight purchases. I couldn't go past their parma prosciutto that would go perfect with the peaches and an immaculate white ball of buffalo milk mozzarella. 

Salad of fresh white peach, prosciutto and buffalo mozzarella

1 cup watercress

1/2 cup torn basil leaves
1 white peach cut into 8 pieces
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
 squeeze of 1/2 lemon
 1 buffalo mozzarella  

6 slices of freshly sliced prosciutto

• Scatter watercress and basil on a plate and tear mozzarella into chunks around salad.
• Place prosciutto and peaches around salad and dress with a sqeeze of lemon and drizzle with oil.
• Season with sea salt and cracked pepper.

Serves 2 as a side

This is such a simple salad which really relies on the freshest and highest quality produce. The prosciutto was so silky to eat along with the fresh peaches and the creaminess of the buffalo mozzarella made the salad come together perfectly. I ate this for my lunch the same day I went to the market but would go great as a part of a meal along side some grilled seafood or meat. A fantastic summer salad.

Source: Inspired by - Salad of fresh peach, serrano ham and buffalo mozzarella, Caroline Velik, Epicure The Age 19/01/10

Festive Baking Sessions

Amidst the frantic choas that was my Christmas, I had planned to make something special for my family.

This is the first recipe I attempted from Bourke Street Bakery - very exciting indeed! As I ranted on previously, this is such a fabulous baking bible which I would love to cook more recipes from in the future.

The section I absolutely adore in this book is the tarts. My tart love was born after tasting the amazing creations at Dolcetti such as pannacotta tart, burnt lemon tart, cherry & walnut crostata, and so SO many more - all divine. So very fittingly, it was only a matter of time I had a go at it myself.

My choice was to make the summer berry custard tarts. I started the very long process of making the shortcrust pasty on Christmas night. This involved rubbing the butter into the flour then gathering the dough to rest for two hours, rolling the dough and resting overnight. I also made creme patisserie for the filling.

When boxing day came, I would cut the dough into discs and mould into the tart tins. This would then need to be frozen for 20mins. I then blind baked them and filled them with the creme pattiserie once cooled. My mum had some excellent fresh and ripe peaches grown in her friend's backyard so I decided to make them into fruit tarts.

 What a joy they were to assemble and present. My long preparation was really worth it. I loved how they looked, and too, they tasted wonderful. My family were just as pleased as I and overall I would say it was a success. I will definitely make them again. I need to work on the consistency or of the custard as it was a little runny but overall I was very happy for my first time.

Delicious baking success!