Hints and Tips

© Margarett Skinner / Aprifel

- Like tomatoes, peaches are easier to peel if you plunge them into boiling water for 30 seconds first, then refresh under cold, running water.

- Sprinkle them with lemon juice to help keep their pretty colour once peeled and cut.

- To poach, plunge a peeled peach sprinkled with lemon juice into boiling sugar syrup, made from a litre of water and a kilo of sugar.  Try poaching them in red wine or in fruit tea as well.

- Add a fruity touch to ice cream, rice pudding or semolina with this quick and easy coulis: Peel 500g ripe peaches, then blend with 125 to 150g brown sugar and the juice of half a lemon.

- Peaches keep for several months in the freezer, peeled, stoned and cut in half.

- Not only do peaches make a delicious dessert: they are also a great, original accompaniment to savoury dishes too. The less sweet, flat peaches, (or vine peaches) go beautifully with poultry, duck and even white fish.