At Lark, when chef John Sundstrom started to see the seats of his restaurant getting empty, he rapidly asked his team to help him come up with  a take away menu. From Tuesday to Saturday through its website, Lark offers meals that makes local produces the star of the feast.

Following his culinary beliefs, the chef of the prestigious restaurant located in Capitol Hill wanted to create a generous recipe made with local and seasonal produce that lets you enjoy the best of the season and of the region.

« Almost every June I try to sneek over to Prosser in the Yakima Valley to pick cherries at my friends Kay Simon and Clay Mackey’s winery, Chinook. Not only do they make beautiful wines, but their cherry orchard supplies some amazing fruit! Use very ripe, just picked cherries for this recipe. », told John Sundstorm to Ici Seattle.

He wanted to share a Clafoutis recipe with our readers.

Clafoutis Batter

  • 6 eggs
  • ¾ cup plus 2 T. sugar
  • ¾ cup heavy cream
  • ¾ cup milk
  • 5 tablespoons all-purpose flour
  • 3 tablespoons powdered sugar

20 ripe cherries, stemmed, washed, but pits left in

Combine all ingredients in food processor, and process until very smooth. Chill 4-24 hours.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Butter and flour an 8 x 12 glass or ceramic baking dish.  Pour ¼ of the batter into the bottom of the dish.  Distribute the cherries on the batter, round side up.  Pour remaining batter over cherries.  Bake 45 to 50 minutes, or until golden and just firm in the center.  Allow to cool slightly.  Dust with powdered sugar.

Serve immediately, spoon custard sauce over clafoutis.

Lemon custard sauce

  • 3 cup Milk
  • 1 cup Cream
  • 8 Lemon Verbena leaves, crushed
  • 1 ¼ cup Sugar
  • 12 egg yolks
  • 1 ½ teaspoon Vanilla extract
  • 2 Lemons, zested and juiced
  • ¼ teaspoon Salt

Method:

Heat milk,cream and lemon verbena leaves. Mix yolks and sugar in bowl, temper with half of hot milk mixture, return to pan, cook slowly until thick enough to coat a spoon, strain through chinoise, whisk in extract, lemon zest and juice and salt, chill.

Visit larkseattle.com to order your take away meals, buy chef Sundstrom’s recipe books or to  help them during the crisis to buy a gift certificate.

During the COVID19 era, the restaurants industry was hit by one of the most violent crisis of its history. For more than two months and without any prior warning, restaurants owners were forced to shut their doors to the public.

If some of them decided to close their ovens during confinement, others reinvented their menus to offer take away meals, created gift certificates, packaged picnic baskets to go and came up with other solutions to keep the business running. Confinement pushed away their clientele but many decided to support them and to thank you for your support, renowned chefs of the region are offering you during the month of June a recipe from their menu to do in the comfort of your home.

Enjoy!