A Recipe for Health- A Melodic Composition

 

 

 

 

Fruit compote is a 17^th century French desert made up of fresh slightly cooked fruits. It is seasoned with orange, lemon, vanilla, cinnamon and cloves. Many Jewish people associate it with holidays. The fruit compote served on holidays is supposed to indicate sweet wishes and good luck in the coming year.

The base of fruit compote is, of course, the fruit. Some variants use dried fruit while others may make berry compote. Some fruit compotes follow a theme, such as tropical compote, while others use preserved fruits in syrup from the summer, or an assortment of whatever looks good. Depending on the type of fruit used, the spicing and level of sweetness is usually adjusted to make the fruit compote's flavor optimal.

Whatever the fruit this is a healthy dessert that packs a punch when it comes to antioxidants. That’s because fruit is a great source of antioxidants, vitamins and minerals. Some of the fruits used are pineapple, peaches, pears, apples, apricots, cherries and berries.

When I was young we lived on an Island off the coast of Maine. It was difficult to get fresh fruit and vegetables in the long winter months. So in the summer my Mother would can fresh fruits so she could make fruit desserts in the winter. Traditionally canned or preserved fruits were used to make compote.

Fruits were first discovered wild. Humans no doubt liked the look, then the smell and finally the taste. Eventually humans began to cultivate fruits and thus began early farming. Today we enjoy a vast variety of fruits from around the world; however, there is nothing better than tree or vine ripened, in season, locally grown fruit. It has a sweetness and texture that just doesn’t exist with half ripened, imported, out of season fruit.

Fruits contain essential vitamins and minerals needed for good health. It’s important to get fresh whole fruits because the vitamins and minerals in fruits have a synergistic effect meaning that they work together to produce the greatest amount of health benefits. For example; oranges are rich in vitamin C, but to get the vitamin C you need a bit of the fleshy white stuff(bioflavonoid) which synergizes with the Vitamin C, delivering the maximum amount of nutrients.

When you mix a variety of fruits together in a fruit salad or compote you get both a wonderful collage of flavors and a healthy portion of nutrients. We need to get three to four servings of fruits a day and sadly most Americans get little to none. The fiber, the skin, the seeds and the pulp of fresh fruits are a far better choice than fruit strips or fruit juice which is often times missing essential nutrients and loaded up with sugar.

There’s nothing like compote of fruits to make for a healthy melodic composition.

 

 

 

 

For dessert its fresh homemade fruit compote. Your choice of fruit, but I chose:

1 pear ripened

2 peaches ripened

3 black apricots soft and ripened

1-      ½ cup unsweetened apple sauce

¼ cup of brown sugar

¼ cup of uncooked oatmeal or any other dry cereal

A few dabs of butter

In a bowl combine the first four ingredients. Mix well and turn into a square baking dish coated with cooking spray. Sprinkle sugar, oatmeal on top and dab small amount of butter randomly on top. Cover and bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes. Serve warm.

Happy New Year-sweet wishes for good luck and good health.

Doctor Lynn