The combination of olive, yoghurt and sesame usually appears in savoury dishes, but chef Jonny Lake cleverly reimagines it into a dessert. Yoghurt comes in the form of a cake, gelato and ganache, but the real star of the show is the black olive caramel – the far more sophisticated version of the universally loved salted caramel.
There are a lot of elements to this dish, but you can make all of them apart from the cake in advance, so little forward planning actually makes serving this dish (relatively!) simple.
Begin by making the caramel, as some of this is rippled through the gelato. It can be made several days in advance. Pour the water, sugar and glucose in a pan and heat until a medium-dark caramel forms. Meanwhile, place the pitted olives in a blender and blitz. You need the olives to reach 80°C – if you have a Thermomix then set it to that, otherwise you may need to blitz and then heat them in a pan until they reach this temperature
Once the olives are blitzed and at 80°C and your caramel has formed, pour the hot caramel over the olives and blitz again until smooth. Blitz in water a little at a time until you have the right consistency for piping. Transfer to a piping bag and reserve in the fridge
Make the gelato in advance too. Add the milk, cream and trimoline to a pan and gently warm. Mix the sugar and Stab 2000 together well, then whisk this into the warm milk. Continue to heat this mixture until it reaches 82°C. Meanwhile, whisk the yoghurt powder into the yoghurt, then place this in a blender with the ice cream base. Blitz until smooth, then cool and churn in a Pacojet or ice cream maker, adding some of the black olive caramel when it's semi-frozen to ripple through it. Reserve in the freezer until needed
To make the cherry sauce, mix all the ingredients together and leave overnight to rehydrate the dried cherries. The next day, bring the mixture to the boil slowly, then blitz until smooth. Transfer to a squeezy bottle
To make the tuiles, heat the milk, butter and glucose in a small pan. Mix the pectin into the sugar, then whisk this into the warm milk mixture. Bring to the boil and boil for 1 minute, then stir in the flour and sesame seeds. Roll the mixture between 2 sheets of baking paper, then place in the freezer to freeze solid
Preheat an oven to 170°C/gas mark 3½. Bake the sheet of tuile mixture for 8-10 minutes until golden, then leave to cool. Break into shards, leave to cool then store in an airtight container until needed
To make the ganache, chop the chocolate and place it in a heatproof bowl. Bring the cream to the boil, then pour it over the chocolate, using a hand blender to emulsify. Add the yoghurt and blend again, then transfer to a piping bag and reserve in the fridge
The final element that needs to be made is the yoghurt sponge. Preheat the oven to 180°C/gas mark 4. Whip the sugar, honey and eggs together until very light and fluffy, and mix together the yoghurt, yoghurt powder and a tiny pinch of salt. Fold the yoghurt mixture through the whipped egg mixture, then sift in the flour and baking powder, folding again to combine
Divide the sponge mixture between mini savarin moulds then bake for 8 minutes until golden. Carefully remove the sponges from their moulds, then brush with honey and coat in toasted sesame seeds
To plate, place a yoghurt sponge on each plate and pipe some black olive caramel into the centre. Pipe a long trail of the yoghurt ganache along the plate, then add a scoop of the yoghurt gelato. Arrange some shards of sesame tuile around the dish, then finish with dots of the cherry sauce and lemon thyme leaves
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