Serving size: Serves 4
Cooking time: More than 2 hours
Course: Dessert

Slow-poached quince with filo fingers

INGREDIENTS

1/2 cup (110g) caster sugar
2 tablespoons honey
1 bay leaf
1 star anise
3 cups (750ml) water
2 large (400g) quinces
FILO FINGERS
4 sheets filo pastry
60g unsalted butter, melted
2 tablespoons hazelnut meal
Icing sugar, for dusting

METHOD

1 Place the sugar, honey, bay leaves, star anise and water in a large saucepan. Stir over medium heat until the sugar is dissolved.
2 Peel quinces, cut into quarters or eighths depending on their size; remove the cores. Add the quince to the syrup; cook over medium heat until the syrup comes to a simmer. Simmer, over low heat for 3 hours 30 minutes or until quince is soft and rosy-coloured.
FILO FINGERS
3 Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 150° C (13° C fan-forced). Line an oven tray with baking paper. Place one sheet of pastry on a clean surface. Brush with a little of the butter; top with remaining sheet of pastry, brushing with more butter. Fold layered pastry in half crossways. Brush with butter; fold in half crossways again. Brush with a little more butter and sprinkle with half the hazelnut meal. Fold in half once more and brush with butter. Cut the rectangle into four long strips; place on the prepared tray. Repeat the process with the remaining ingredients to make another four pastry fingers. Bake for about 10 minutes or until golden brown. Dust with sifted icing sugar
4 Serve quince and some of the poaching liquid with Filo Fingers and vanilla ice-cream, thick cream or yogurt, if desired.

Filo Fingers suitable to freeze. Butter suitable to microwave.

MICHELE’S NOTE: It’s seems a shame not to cook a double or triple batch of these quinces. Store the extra quinces and syrup in the fridge and serve them with porridge or muesli for breakfast. For a quick quince dessert, thinly slice the poached quince over puff pastry for a quick and sumptuous tart or fold through a butter cake mixture for a rich twist on a tea-cake.
As seen in the Australian Womaen's Weekly July 2011 issue

Photography: Brett Stevens
Styling: David Morgan