Apricot orchards at Godshill Orchards on the Isle of Wight consist of 4,000 trees of six cultivars: sunnycot, tomcot, flavourcot, ladycot, perlecot and digat. Apricots prefer moderately cold winters, mild dry springs, and hot dry summers. Despite capricious weather, this year looks extremely productive in the UK, and for peaches too. The soft stone fruit season begins earlier in Italy (the name "apricot" likely comes from Latin praecox, meaning precocious), and it has been a good year there as well, with talk of a glut.
How to select and use apricots and peaches
Of all soft stone fruit, apricots are perhaps easiest to read: pale flesh with a greenish tint indicates they are not ready; a deep, glowing orange signals ripeness. Generally, the stronger the colour, the sweeter the fruit. However, colour is no guarantee of sweetness or texture—there is always a chance the flesh will be woolly and bland. But there are solutions.
Apricots and peaches share fleshy sweetness and acidity with tomatoes, so they pair well with thick slices of mozzarella and basil for a tricolour dish. Wedges of both go beautifully with thin slices of prosciutto or smoked ham—summer on a plate—requiring no cooking, only the effort to find properly ripe fruit. Nigel Slater suggests a cool peach, cucumber and peanut salad with a white tahini, soy and toasted sesame oil dressing. Roast chicken with a peach and mint salad, dressed with mint, light chilli and lime juice, is another Nigel suggestion for a hot day.
Grilling and cooking with stone fruit
For less luscious fruit, apply heat: brush halves lightly with oil, sprinkle with salt, and sear on a griddle pan or barbecue. Alternatively, brush stoneless halves with honey and grill. Both methods bring out sweetness. Grilled fruit can be paired with grilled halloumi, as in Georgina Hayden’s sandwich with roast apricot jam, or used in Thomasina Miers’s grilled nectarine and burrata with pickled onions. Georgina also suggests grilled peach, gorgonzola and thyme tartine, while Yotam Ottolenghi makes a grilled peach salsa for chicken schnitzel.
Apricots pair beautifully with pork: Nigel bakes chops with halved apricots, letting the fat mingle with the softening fruit, then stirs in yellow mustard seeds and fennel. Apricots also have an affinity with lamb; their sweet acidity brings out the meat's sweetness. I often bake lamb chops with peach wedges.
No-cook and dessert ideas
For a refreshing pudding, put chunks of apricot or peach in a bowl, cover with cold rosé, add ice cubes and ripped basil. Alternatively, tear ripe apricots in half and top with ricotta, honey and chopped pistachios. For a granita, blend ripe fruit into a puree, add sugar, and freeze until it can be scratched with a fork.
If apricots are woolly, jam is the solution; use instant pectin for a stress-free process. Ravneet Gill poaches apricots with almond cream, Jeremy Lee cooks them in spicy syrup with lemon biscuits, and Felicity Cloake makes a nutty apricot tart best served with cold cream.
Other food highlights
Turkish food writer Özlem Warren’s second book, Istanbul, is a love letter to her 15 years in the city. The home-cooking chapter includes bulgur pilaf with peppers, onions and tomatoes, easy manti (dumplings with minced meat and yogurt), and beans and carrot palaki. Her teaching experience shines through.
Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin’s The Golovlyov Family (1880), called the gloomiest book in Russian literature, is dark and hilarious, full of food: mushrooms, jam, ham, peas, asparagus, raspberries, and vodka.
For a quick meal, hydrate instant couscous with equal parts boiling water, fluff, and add a creamy paste made from cherry tomatoes blended with olive oil and salt. Stir through, then toss with chopped tomatoes, feta, and cucumber. For a stone fruit twist, try Nik Sharma’s feta, nectarines, red onion and couscous salad.
