Nigel Slater’s blackcurrant recipes | Summer food and drink (2024)

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Nigel Slater recipes

At once sweet and piercingly tart, blackcurrants are the most lovable of summer fruits, here paired with almonds in a tasty tart and with poppy seeds in Chelsea buns

Nigel Slater

Sun 16 Aug 2015 13.00 BST

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Picking blackcurrants was my first-ever job. Perhaps I should say the first I was actually paid for – my parents being the sort who felt children should earn their keep chopping logs for the fireplace or mowing the lawn in stripes with military exactitude. I spent many a summer on local farms, picking fruit destined for sweet and sticky cordials.

Without the packed lunches the other workers brought with them I ate blackcurrants for breakfast, lunch and tea – plump berries warmed by the sun. Berries that managed to be sweet and yet piercingly tart at the same time. I have loved them ever since, in ice cream and trifle, soft-crusted pies or warmed with sugar and a little water till they burst, then spooned lavishly over ripe peaches and vanilla ice cream.

This week I added raw currants to an almond tart – not the usual frangipane sponge filling but a soft, macaroon-style interior in a crisp case. The almond mixture was crisp on top, fudgy within and the blackcurrants burst and rippled the mixture with juice. As if that wasn’t enough I made buns too – round, chubby little chaps like Chelseas, stuffed with bleeding purple berries and crunchy with poppy seeds. Happy days indeed.

Blackcurrant almond tart

Serves 8
for the pastry:
butter 100g
caster sugar 100g
egg yolks 2
plain flour 250g
baking powder 1 tsp
water 2 tbsp

for the filling:
ground almonds 200g
icing sugar 200g
plain flour 2 heaped tbsp
blackcurrants 300g
egg whites 3
cream to serve
You will also need a 25cm tart tin with a removable base

To make the pastry crust, cream the butter and caster sugar together in a food mixer or by hand until the mixture is light and fluffy, then add the egg yolks. Combine the flour and baking powder, then fold into the batter with the water to give a firm, soft dough. Tip the dough on to a lightly floured work surface, knead gently for less than a minute, then roll into a ball, wrap in clingfilm and refrigerate for a minimum of 30 minutes. You can leave it in the fridge overnight if that is convenient.

Blackcurrant and poppy seed buns

Makes 9
skimmed milk 220ml
butter 50g
white flour 450g
fast-acting yeast 7g
caster sugar 1 tbsp
salt ½ tsp
poppy seeds 2 tbsp
an egg, lightly beaten
a lemon

for the filling:
blackcurrants, stalked 450g
butter 50g
caster sugar 50g

to finish:
milk 2 tbsp
demerara sugar 1 tbsp
the reserved poppy seeds

You will also need a round 24cm cake tin, lined on the base with baking parchment

Warm the milk and butter in a small saucepan. Put the flour into a large bowl, add the yeast, sugar, salt and half the poppy seeds. Pour in the warm butter and milk (it should be no hotter than your little finger can bear) and add the egg yolk. Combine thoroughly, then knead for a good 8 minutes by hand, or about half that if you are using an electric mixer and dough hook. Put the dough into a bowl, cover with clingfilm and put in a warm place for an hour, till it has doubled in size.

Tip the dough out on to a floured board then roll into a rectangle about 24 x 32 cm, with the longest side towards you. Put the blackcurrants into a bowl, add the butter in small lumps and the sugar, then stir to combine. Scatter the currant mixture over the dough. Roll the dough up towards you, as tight as you can to give a long, fat roll. Cut into nine equal slices and place in the lined tin.

Nigel Slater’s blackcurrant recipes | Summer food and drink (2024)

Blackcurrant almond tart

Blackcurrant and poppy seed buns

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