Delia Smith Summer Fruit Compote

Delia Smith’s summer fruit compote is peaches, apricots, plums and blueberries baked uncovered at 180C for 25-30 minutes, with raspberries stirred in after. It serves 6 from The Delia Collection: Puddings.

Delia also has a lemongrass version in her Summer Collection, where she blitzes the stalks into the sugar before baking. She says the lemongrass is “barely there, but it does add a very interesting dimension.” This plain version lets the fruit speak for itself.

The technique that matters is when the raspberries go in. Delia adds them only after the dish comes out of the oven, folding them into the hot juices. Baked raspberries collapse into mush, but stirred in off the heat they hold their shape and colour.

Delia Smith Summer Fruit Compote

Recipe by Pinch PerfectCourse: DessertCuisine: BritishDifficulty: Easy

Servings

6

servings

Prep time

10

minutes

Cooking time

25

minutes

Calories

150

kcal

From The Delia Collection: Puddings. Stone fruit baked in its own juices with just 50g of sugar, finished with raw raspberries for colour and sharpness. Delia says any mixture of fruit works, but blackcurrants should be halved because they dominate.

Ingredients

• 3 peaches

• 6 apricots

• 6 large plums

• 225g (8 oz) blueberries

• 175g (6 oz) raspberries

• 50g (2 oz) sugar, plus extra if needed

• Equipment

• Shallow baking dish, approximately 30cm (12 inches) in diameter

Directions

• Preheat the oven to 180C (350F), gas mark 4.
• Halve each peach by making a slit all round through the natural crease, then twist in half and remove the stone. Cut the halves into three pieces each and place them in the baking dish.
• Do the same with the apricots and, if they’re large, slice the halves into two. If they’re small, leave the halves whole.
• Repeat with the plums, but if they’re clinging too tightly to their stones, slice them into quarters on the stone and pull each quarter off. Add the apricots and plums to the peaches in the dish, followed by the blueberries.
• Sprinkle the sugar over the fruit. Place the dish in the centre of the oven and bake uncovered for 25-30 minutes. The fruit is ready when tender to a skewer and the juices have run.
• Remove from the oven and gently stir in the raspberries, tipping the dish and basting them with the hot juices. Taste to check the sugar and add more if needed.
• Cool the compote and chill in the fridge. Serve with creme fraiche.

Notes

• If you want to make this entirely with soft berries, it needs only 10 minutes in the oven.

FAQs

Why does Delia add the raspberries after baking?

Raspberries fall apart under heat. Their cell walls are thinner than stone fruit, so 25 minutes at 180C would turn them to pulp. By stirring them into the hot juices off the heat, Delia cooks them just enough to release flavour while keeping each berry intact.

This is the same thinking behind her summer fruit brulee, where she heats soft fruit for only 3-5 minutes before topping with cream. Raspberries add a sharp, bright contrast to the sweeter baked stone fruit. If they cooked alongside the peaches, you’d lose that contrast entirely.

Can I use different fruit in this compote?

Delia says any mixture works, with one warning: blackcurrants should be used at half quantity because their flavour dominates everything else. Nectarines swap directly for peaches. Cherries work well but need pitting, which adds prep time.

For an all-berry version with no stone fruit, Delia cuts the baking time to just 10 minutes. Strawberries, blackberries, redcurrants and blueberries all work here. The key is matching soft fruits together so they cook at the same rate, since a plum needs 25 minutes but a strawberry needs five.

Why does Delia bake the fruit uncovered instead of covering it?

Covering the dish traps steam, which turns the fruit to mush. Baking uncovered lets moisture evaporate, so the juices concentrate and thicken naturally. You end up with a syrupy pool at the bottom rather than watery liquid.

The shallow 30cm dish matters here too. Delia chooses a wide, flat dish so the fruit sits in a single layer with maximum surface area exposed to the oven heat. Piling fruit into a deep dish means the pieces on top dry out while the ones underneath stew. One layer, uncovered, even cooking.

How long does this compote keep in the fridge?

The compote keeps well for 3-4 days in the fridge, covered. The fruit softens slightly each day as it sits in its own syrup, but this isn’t a bad thing. Day-two compote is often better than day-one because the flavours merge.

After 4 days the raspberries start to break down and the colour dulls. Freezing works for up to 3 months, but the stone fruit goes softer on thawing. It’s still good spooned over porridge or vanilla ice cream, just not as pretty as fresh.

What is the best way to serve this compote?

Delia suggests creme fraiche, which adds tang against the sweet fruit. She also recommends her blackcurrant ice cream or gooseberry and elderflower ice cream from the same book. If you’re building a summer menu, asparagus with nearly hollandaise makes a clean starter before this.

This compote sits in the middle ground between a raw fruit salad and a cooked pudding. It works cold as a starter on a warm day, or spooned over pavlova as a topping. Warm it gently and serve alongside pancakes for a simple weekend breakfast. At 150 calories per serving without any cream, it’s one of the lightest desserts in her collection.

How do I know when the stone fruit is properly baked?

Delia says to test with a skewer. Push it into the thickest piece of peach or plum. It should slide through with no resistance, like pushing into butter. If there’s any firmness at the centre, give it another 5 minutes.

The juices tell you too. When the fruit is ready, you’ll see a pool of pink-amber syrup in the dish. Under-baked fruit sits dry with barely any liquid. The sugar needs time to draw out the natural juices, and the fruit’s pectin needs heat to break down. That syrup is the whole point of a compote, so don’t rush it.