Craven College’s Jamie Fletcher provides another of his favourite recipes. He has more than 10 years’ experience working in bars and restaurants, including a 15-month stint as a sous-chef in the south of France.

CLAFOUTIS is a traditional French sweet batter pudding. It is traditionally made with cherries but you can use most stone fruits - I've used plums in this one. Other fruit to consider are apricots (bottled ones are worth using if you can't get good ripe fresh ones) or semi-dried prunes, soaked in hot water or tea.

It is a straightforward dish to make as the hard work is all in the preparation so its a great pudding to have with Sunday lunch; the ingredients can be assembled in advance and then cooked while you're eating.

Ingredients

500g plums

125g caster sugar

60g plain flour

3 eggs, separated

1 vanilla pod

200g milk

100g cream

Small amount of butter, sugar, flour for dusting the dish

Method

1 Combine the flour and sugar in a large mixing bowl and slowly and gently whisk in the milk, cream and egg yolks to make a light batter. Halve the vanilla pods lengthways, scrape out the seeds and mix them into the batter. Leave the mixture to stand in a cool place for an hour or two.

2 Preheat the oven to Gas 5/200 degrees. Grease the baking dish with butter and lightly sprinkle with sugar and flour - not too much, just a dusting. Meanwhile slice the plums in half lengthways and remove the stones. Add the fruit cut side up to the dish and sprinkle with sugar if the fruit is not as ripe as you'd like.

3 In a separate clean mixing bowl whisk the egg whites until they form soft peaks. Now pour the egg batter mix over the egg whites and gently fold the whole thing together until the mixture is just combined.

4 Carefully pour the batter mix over the fruit and put the dish into the oven for about 30 minutes. You want the top to be brown and the inside to be half-set. If it looks like the top is browning too quickly, lower the heat to Gas 4 /180 degrees and cover the dish with foil while you continue cooking.

5 Once cooked, remove from the oven and leave to cool slightly. This dish is best served warm but not too hot. It's very sweet and rich so you probably won't need cream but feel free to serve some if you wish.