Peaches in honey

Regular readers of this column will know by now that I love serving fruit for dessert because it's an easy, healthy, inexpensive and tasty way to round off any meal.

In these days of galloping food prices consumers are becoming more and more price conscious and using fruit as a main dessert ingredient is certainly a value-for-money option.

Besides, many chefs and home cooks would much rather spend time on the main meal than on the sweet treat for afterwards — and on a personal level I would much rather have cheese, biscuits, preserve and a glass or two of port any time ahead of a sticky sweet dessert.

It is actually quite amazing how much one can do with fresh fruit, from baking and stewing to grilling and even frying. And the same goes for what to serve with it, because ice cream, ordinary cream or a simple honey-based sauce all go well with most fruits.

For today's dessert you need:

Instructions:

Pour 550ml water into a large pan and add the sugar and honey.

Stir over low heat until sugar has been dissolved.

Bring to the boil and let it bubble fiercely for 10 minutes.

Add the peaches, reduce heat, cover and simmer for six to 10 minutes until peaches are just soft.

Remove peaches and set aside to cool.

Bring syrup back to the boil and reduce to about 240ml.

Serve the peaches warm with the syrup on its own or with a good dollop of ice cream.

You can also spruce this up by serving it with wedges of (bought) apple tart or fruity pie.