Figs and Ricotta – Recipe

Figs with ricotta, honey and several little garnishes

I'm really enjoying this theme of using simple but fantastic ingredients and doing almost nothing to them. Much like the shaved summer squash salad of a few weeks ago, these perfectly ripe figs were spectacular with a bare minimum of manipulation. I think I would like to do a whole dinner party where every course followed this aesthetic.

[By the way, I'll be announcing the winner of the cookbook for each week's recipe testers over on the Herbivoracious facebook page each Wednesday.]

The additional ingredients are Calabro ricotta (the only national ricotta worthy of the name), lime zest, tarragon, blackberry honey, saffron, and a few tiny pyramids of Big Tree Farms salt.

This is quite a few adornments for a fig, but what makes it work is that you use tiny amounts of most of them. Each bite becomes exciting and different; one tastes like citrus and the next of herb, and another has the metallic tang of saffron.

You can add a little visual interest by cutting the figs "randomly", that is not parallel or perpendicular to the base.

Needless to say, I'll give you a recipe, but you should absolutely take this as a concept and run with it in any direction you like. The same idea would work with a perfect peach. The lime could be lemon or yuzu or nothing. Tarragon could be shiso or basil or anise hyssop. Honey could be elderberry syrup or a drizzle of good balsamic vinegar.

By the way, a great free tool both for discovering and storing these types of flavor combinations is Cuuks.com.

Figs and Ricotta
Vegetarian and gluten-free
Serves 4
5 minutes

• 1/2 cup Calabro ricotta (or homemade)
• 4 perfectly ripe figs
• 1/4 cup blackberry honey
• 8 small strips of lime zest
• 12 fresh tarragon leaves
• big pinch of saffron, crushed
• pyramidal sea salt

1. Form the ricotta into quenelles and put one in each of 4 bowls.
2. Cut each fig into 3 odd-shaped pieces, and put the pieces from 1 fig in each bowl.
3. Drizzle the honey in the bottom of bowls.
4. Garnish each bowl with 2 strips of lime zest and 3 leaves of tarragon. Sprinkle the saffron powder in a fine line on the ricotta. Distribute a few crystals of salt in each bowl and serve immediately.