The Film:
The Dish:
The Reason:
A buckle is a sweet taste of the south, which is what you’ll need after joining Solomon Northup (Chiwetel Ejioforn) in his twelve years in hell. Here you’ll find blackberries, with their tricklings of juice contributing both a twinkling acidity- and potentially a source of ink to send a surreptitious note to your family and friends to let them know you’ve been stolen and enslaved. And then there’s the downy pillows of pudding. Unlike your standard crumble or a crisp, this inverts the normal order, having the cake on the bottom and the fruit above. As it bakes the fruit sinks, while the batter rises, causing everything to buckle. You could see the dish as a metaphor for disruption, subjugation, inversion of natural laws, or the rising strength of of an individual’s resilience. Or you could just see it as dessert. Whichever way, serve this with lashings of ice cream or cream (which will hopefully be the only iteration of that term you’ll have to contend with for a while).
The Way:
Serves 4-6
Equipment
1 x 23 cm oven safe baking dish
Shopping/foraging
90 g unsalted butter
4 cups/550 g blackberries (frozen is ok)
1 tbsp icing/powdered sugar
juice and rind of half a lemon
3/4 cup caster sugar
1/2 cup/125 ml milk
1/2 cup natural yoghurt
2 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1 1/4 cups plain flour
2 tbsp raw/coarse sugar
Here’s how we roll
1) Preheat the oven to 170C/340 F.
2) Place the butter in the bottom of the baking dish and place in the oven while it preheats, so the butter melts and lightly browns.
3) Combine the blackberries with the powdered sugar, lemon juice and zest.
4)In a separate bowl whisk together the sugar, milk and yoghurt.
5) Sift in the flour, cinnamon, baking powder and salt. Stir to combine.
6) Dab the batter over the top of the melted butter. The butter will seep and trickle around the edges and form a lake-like perimeter. That’s ok.
7) Scatter the blackberries over the top of the butter and batter.
8) Place in the oven and bake for 45 minutes. After 45 minutes, when the batter is puffed and bronzed, but there is still a little gloopiness in the centre, scatter the top with the raw sugar and return to the oven for another 10-15 minutes, until it has browned.
9) Serve hot, with ice cream or cream.
The Rest of Oscarsfeast 2014:
