Bacon Wrapped Brandied Apricots

This is the first appetiser that I made for the dinner for eight the other night. I had wanted to serve an appetiser with bacon and tossed up a variety of options. Searching the web yielded a few recipes with ham wrapped fruits as well as bacon wrapped fruits. I found a few websites that featured apricots wrapped in bacon and that idea stuck in my head!

The recipe is really easy and the result is quite spectacular both in presentation and in taste as well. The saltiness and meatiness of the bacon contrasted really well with the apricots.





This is what I did:

Ingredients
30 dried Apricots
2 Tbsp Orange Juice
1 Tbsp Brandy
10 rashers back bacon
Method
Soak the Apricots in the mix of orange juice and brandy for at least 2 hours to rehydrate the apricots. Trim the fat off the bacon and cut into three strips (lenghtwise). Wrap the apricots in the bacon strips and secure with a toothpick. Place on a baking tray and bake for about 30 minutes till the bacon is cooked and the apricots are slightly tender.

Now how easy is that! My son sampled a few before he had to leave for his birthday party and declared it a success. The guests really enjoyed popping them into their mouths as appetisers with their drinks and it got polished off very, very quickly.

Aren't Apricots just lovely...

The apricot is a wonderful fruit! When I was a student, I used to enjoy a bottle of fresh apricot juice with my lunch. It wasn’t called Apricot juice but rather Apricot Nectar. I think the reason for that is that juice doesn't quite do justice to Apricots. Nectar is more accurate because the juice of the fruit is so luscious. Better than drinking the juice though, is to sink your teeth into the delicious fruit.

It doenst stop there thought. Apricots are great to use in cooking! To most people, if you think of using fruits in cooking, images of desserts come to mind. No doubt apricots are lovely in desserts but they can be used in main meals as well. And not just as a garnish! Try mixing it in salads, or perhaps toss in a few apricots together with some vegetables and roast them, flavour a chicken stew with apricots or why not make an apricot sauce as a marinade? Let your imagination flow and use apricots – as well as other fruits – in your cooking. There’s nothing quite like it!




The only problem I have with Apricots is that they are so darned expensive. Even the dried variety is expensive over here in Malaysia. I've use Apricots in my cooking and these are two original recipes that I have made that feature Apricots.

Chicken with Apricots
Apricot Walnut Cheesecake