Surprise Your Guests with a Cherry Clafoutis

Surprise guests with a summer dessert that’s not the expected crumble or pie. Make a cherry clafoutis: a rich custard studded with ripe, sweet cherries, and dusted with powdered sugar. French desserts may seem intimidating, but clafoutis (pronounced “cla-foo-tee”) couldn’t be easier. You don’t even have to do any mixing, because you can whip up the batter right in the blender.

Now traditionally, clafoutis is made with unpitted cherries, because purists say that the baked pits added a nice almond note to the dessert. But digging into a delicious dessert and biting down into a cherry pit is the pits! So we removed the cherry pits but kept the almond flavor with a touch of almond extract (it’s optional if you don’t have any in the cupboard).

Cherry Clafoutis
Prep: 10 Mins | Total: 40 Mins
Serves: 6-8 servings
Difficulty: Easy
Ingredients
3/4 Pound Cherries, pitted (about 2 cups)
1 Tablespoon Unsalted Butter, softened
3 each Eggs
6 Tablespoons Granulated Sugar, divided
2/3 Cup Milk
1/2 teaspoon Kosher Salt
1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
1/4 teaspoon Almond Extract (Optional)
1/4 Cup Powdered Sugar (Optional)
2/3 Cup All-purpose flour
Directions
Pit the cherries: remove the stem, and place a cherry on the mouth of the bottle. Use a chopstick to press down through the top of the cherry and pop the pit out into the bottle.
Preheat the oven to 350°F/175°C.
Grease a 9­-inch pie pan with butter, then sprinkle it with one tablespoon of the sugar, turning the pan to coat the sides lightly with sugar, and shaking off the excess. Arrange the pitted cherries evenly in the buttered pie dish.
In a blender, add eggs, the rest of the sugar, milk, salt, vanilla extract, and almond extract (if using). Blend on high speed until the batter is fully mixed and frothy, about 30 seconds to 1 minute. The batter will be very thin.
Pour the batter into your prepared pan, and bake until the custard is firm and golden brown, about 30 to­ 35 minutes.
Once baked, allow the clafoutis to cool slightly, and then dust it with the powdered sugar.
Chef Tips
Do not over-bake this dish. Baking it for too long could result in a rubbery clafoutis. As soon as the clafoutis is golden around the edges, puffed up, and just set, it is ready to come out of the oven.

And if you’re giving this recipe the side-eye thinking there are plenty of things you’ve rather do than pit a pound of cherries, we’ve got a tip for easy cherry pitting that’s going to knock your socks off. (You could even call it the cherry on top of this already insanely easy dessert recipe.) If you have a cherry pitter at home, lucky you — but if you don’t, just grab a chopstick and a bottle with a skinny neck, position the cherry on the mouth of the bottle, and use the chopstick to pop the pit right out.

Cutie-patootie cherry clafoutis is such a show-off — but so easy to make, you’ll feel like you’re cheating when everyone oohs and ahhs as you cut in to reveal those big, juicy cherries.