Looking for a fast and easy dessert? Consider popovers.
This simple pastry — they resemble large, inflated muffins, but are hollow — comes together in almost no time and calls for just a handful of ingredients. Even better, the batter can be made the night ahead. And because popovers aren’t particularly sweet, they work as well with sweet fillings for dessert as they do for breakfast.
Here’s how it works. You make the batter in the blender whenever you have a spare 5 minutes (up to 24 hours ahead of time). Refrigerate it until you are ready to use it (just pop it back on the blender base for a quick whir before using).
For a dessert, heat the oven while you make dinner. As you sit down to eat, pour the batter into a popover pan, pop that in the oven, then go enjoy dinner. By the time you finish, the popovers will be done.
Then just tear a small opening and spoon in a filling — I’ve offered a simple mascarpone cream, but use whatever moves you — and you’re done.
For a second serving as breakfast, save half of the batter for the next morning, then bake a fresh batch and serve with jam and butter.
Cardamom popovers with cinnamon mascarpone and berries
For the popovers:
2cups all-purpose flour
2cups milk
4large eggs
2tablespoons butter, melted
1tablespoon sugar
1teaspoon salt
1/2teaspoon ground cardamom
For the filling:
28-ounce tubs mascarpone
2tablespoons honey
Juice and zest of 1 lemon
2teaspoons cinnamon
Sliced strawberries or other fresh berries, to serve
Heat the oven to 400 degrees. Coat a 6-cup popover pan with cooking spray.
In a blender, combine the flour, milk, eggs, butter, sugar, salt and cardamom. Blend until the ingredients form a very smooth batter, about 1 minute. Fill each of the prepared popover pan cups about halfway with batter. You should use only half of the batter in the blender. The remainder can be baked as a second batch or refrigerated for up to 24 hours.
Bake for 30 minutes. Remove the popovers from the pan and use a knife to cut a small hole in the top of each to let the steam escape. Cool slightly.
Meanwhile, to prepare the filling, in a medium bowl gently stir together the mascarpone, honey, lemon juice and zest, and the cinnamon. When the popovers have cooled just enough to handle, carefully tear the opening in each just enough to be able to spoon in about 1/4 cup of the filling. Serve each with sliced strawberries or other fresh berries.
Makes 12 srvings. Per serving (using 1/2 cup strawberries per serving): 510 calories; 300 calories from fat (59 percent of total calories); 34 g fat (18 g saturated; 0 g trans fats); 175 mg cholesterol; 40 g carbohydrate; 13 g protein; 3 g fiber; 330 mg sodium.
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