When the Australian prima donna Nellie Melba performed in Wagner’s opera “Lohengrin” at Covent Garden in London in 1892, Auguste Escoffier, the chef of the Savoy, was also in the audience. In short order, he created a dessert that he served her the next evening. He apparently knew about her preference for peaches. The first version was a dessert of peaches on a bed of vanilla ice cream arranged in a bowl, nestled between beautiful swan wings carved out of a block of ice. For this vegan version, I decided to mix a melon into the pêche melba and use the melon rind as a frozen bowl. The vanilla glacé effect comes from the creamy cashews and bourbon vanilla and is mixed together with the pêche melba in this recipe. Have fun with healthy “spooning”.
Recipe (2 portions)
Ingredients
1 Galia melon, halved
1 handful of raspberries, frozen
1 peach
1 handful of cashew nuts
1 tsp bourbon vanilla seeds, dried
Topping
approx. 12 raspberries, fresh
1 peach, fresh
Coconut chips
Grated coconut
Preparation
Scoop out the two halves of the melon using a soup spoon. Put the flesh in a freezer bag and place in the freezer compartment for 2 hours, freeze the hollowed-out shells as well.Now wash and pit the peach and cut into slices and place these in a freezer bag as well and freeze for 2 hours.Meanwhile, fry the coconut chips in a frying pan until golden brown.When everything is frozen, place the melon, peach and frozen raspberries in a high-powered blender.
Add the cashew nuts and vanilla and blend to a homogeneous smoothie ice cream, pour immediately into the two frozen melon bowls and decorate with the fresh raspberries, peach and grated coconut and coconut chips.
Auguste Escoffier and Nellie Melba