This delicious dessert was invented by the great French chef Auguste Escoffier in 1892 in honor of Nellie Melba, a talented Australian-born opera singer.
Originally it was a very elaborate spoon dessert. It was described by Escoffier in this way: “Thinking back to the majestic mythical swan that appeared in the first act of Lohengrin, I had her serve, at the right moment, peaches arranged on a bed of vanilla ice cream, inside a cup of silver wedged between the wings of a superb swan sculpted in a block of ice and covered with a veil of cotton candy.”
Later, in 1900, the chef adapted it by eliminating the ice sculpture and the cotton candy sugar and adding the raspberry purée.
It was a very popular ice cream cup in Italian bars when I was a child. During my first summer trip to France with my parents, it was the dessert I ate most often.
Today it is impossible to find it and I don’t understand why! Among other things, when you don’t want to cook a dessert (and, above all, turn on the oven) in the summer, it’s an easy trick to take beautiful, juicy peaches and homemade ice cream and easily assemble a delicious after-meal snack.
Peach Melba
- Preparation time: 20 minutes
- Ingredients for 4 servings
- Difficulty: Easy recipe
- Ingredients
- 2 peaches
- For the syrup:
- 4 oz (100 grams) of water
- 2 oz (50 grams) of sugar
- For the raspberry sauce:
- 4 oz (100 grams) of raspberries
- 2 tablespoons of sugar
- 2 tablespoons of water
- juice of ½ lemon
- For the ice cream:
- 1 lb (450 grams) of vanilla ice cream
- For decoration:
- Flaked almonds to taste
- Ice cream wafers to taste
- Instructions
- Prepare the syrup. Put the water and sugar in a saucepan. Stir until all the sugar dissolves.
- Cut the peaches in half, remove the pit, peel them and cook them in the syrup (without boiling) for about ten minutes. Turn off the heat and let them cool immersed in the syrup. As soon as they are cold, put them in the refrigerator. Drain them before assembling the dessert.
- Prepare the raspberry sauce. Put the sugar, lemon, water and raspberry in a pan. As soon as they boil, turn off the heat. Blend everything with an immersion blender.
- Take 4 serving bowls and fill the bottom with vanilla ice cream. Put ½ peach on the ice cream and cover it with the raspberry sauce
- Decorate with sliced almonds and wafers.
Tips to ensure the success of the dish:
- You can obviously use canned peaches, but it isn’t the same.
- You can toast the almonds in the oven at 250°F for 15 minutes, then cut them into strips.
