Compote

Compote is fruit cooked slowly in a little sugar and liquid until it is soft but still in pieces. It is less sweet and looser than jam, and it is not meant to set. You can serve it warm or cold, on its own or with yogurt, porridge, pancakes, cake or ice cream.

How to do it

1. Cut fresh or frozen fruit into bite-size pieces. Berries can stay whole.
2. Put the fruit in a pan with sugar. Start with about 1 part sugar to 5 parts fruit by weight and adjust for the fruit's sweetness.
3. Add a splash of water, juice or wine, enough to stop the fruit sticking.
4. Add flavor if you like: lemon zest, a cinnamon stick, vanilla, or star anise.
5. Simmer gently, stirring now and then, until the fruit is soft and the juice is syrupy. Berries take about 5 to 10 minutes. Apples and pears take 15 to 20.
6. Take it off the heat and let it cool. It thickens as it cools.

How to tell it is done

The fruit is tender when pierced with a knife but has not all turned to mush. The syrup is glossy and runs slowly off a spoon.

How to store it

Cool it, then keep it in a clean, covered jar in the fridge for about a week. It also freezes well for a few months. Compote has less sugar than jam, so it does not keep at room temperature unless you can it properly.

Common mistakes

• Boiling it hard. The fruit breaks down into a purée.
• Adding too much sugar at the start. You can always add more later.
• Stirring too much. Soft fruit like berries falls apart.

In recipes

"Compote" means chunky cooked fruit. A coulis is cooked or raw fruit that is blended and strained smooth. In Nordic cooking, kompott is common, and stewed lingonberries are served with meat. Some recipes macerate fruit in sugar without cooking and call it a "raw compote".

Where it comes from

The word is French, from the Latin for "put together". It is related to "compost".