Stone Fruit Compote/Syrup

Hello! It’s been a while. But although there seemed to be silence, there was actually a lot going on behind the scenes over here.

So…without further delay, welcome to the new 80 Breakfasts!

Sometime last year, I started feeling the urge to do something more with this site. Not that I had any grand plans or schemes – 80 Breakfasts was, and remains to be, my own personal playground, where I share my culinary adventures, maybe some mishaps, and interspersed throughout, snippets of life (because isn’t all food and eating just really intertwined with life?). But I felt we needed change. I say we meaning me and this little blog. At the heart of it all, I realized that I wanted to give more to this blog…as it has given me so much joy over the past almost-10 years.

So I did what all girls do when they want to treat someone. I took my baby to the spa for a makeover!

The spa and makeover care of two very talented women: Martine of Make It Blissful and Patricia of Fancy Girl Designs.

I sat down with Martine late last year to chat about what I wanted. Yes, I had been blogging for 10 years. Yes, I know (very much so) why I blog…reasons which haven’t changed at all for the past decade (goodness, I feel ancient!). But I wanted fresh perspective, and Martine was a wellspring of knowledge…aside from being a great girl herself and a joy to hang out with!

Patricia I have worked with before, when I did my first blog redesign, a simple one. I loved what she did so I really wanted to work with her again, especially now that I was getting my own domain (*big squee!*). She was as lovely (and patient!) as she was the first time around. And I couldn’t be happier with the results.

I wanted the site to still have a familiar look and feel, after all 80 Breakfasts is still 80 Breakfasts. This blog, and I, will stand for the same things we have always stood for since day 1: Everything to do with good food, from shopping for ingredients and tools, to cooking, to eating, to sharing…and how food and eating and cooking can (and should!) be a wonderful (as well as integral) part of life. Real life. Messy tables and secret chocolate stashes. The best scrambled eggs and the truffle oil you bought by taking part of the gas money (sorry husband!). Decadent sweets and simple comfort food. Trying your hand at a new recipe for an exotic Thai curry as well as making that criminally easy baked chicken that you have made a hundred times before. Family, friends, life, love, food. That will always be what you find here.

I also wanted to spruce things up around here though. Dust things off, clean up the look, have more functionality, share more of my photos, find more ways to connect with all of you nice folk. You can now search through my archives or by category very easily (look to the right!). You can also go directly to the Recipes tab above (look up!) and search for a particular recipe there. You can also take a peek at what goes on day to day in my Instagram feed at the bottom (look down!). You can also subscribe to my site (there on the right also) and get updates right in your own inbox.  We may still have to polish some things as we go along but I was just too excited to keep this in its wrapping any longer. So, take a look around a let me know what you think!

Meanwhile…here’s a little something sweet to keep you company.

Stone Fruit Compote/Syrup

• 350 grams sliced and de-seeded stone fruit (I used a mix of plums and nectarines)
• 175 grams sugar
• 1/4 cup water

– Place the fruit, sugar, and water in a saucepan over low heat and cook until the sugar dissolves, the fruits soften, and the liquid thickens slightly. This could take 20-30 minutes, or even a little bit more. You want a sticky but loose consistency that is more pourable than jammy.

This is halfway between a compote and a syrup, and is basically a very easy recipe to make fruits into a sticky sauce to serve with a myriad of things. I think it would be great as part of a brunch spread with yogurt, French toast, or pancakes. Or for dessert drizzled on vanilla ice cream or a slice of pound cake.  It’s really delicious and super easy to make…and it has less additives than any syrup you buy at the grocery (a bonus!). This is also a great way to utilize of fruits that have been hanging around and need using up. I can see this working with mangoes, strawberries, pineapple, cherries (I have done this before with cherries…amazing!), or even apples and pears (although they may take longer to soften). You can also combine fruits as I have done here. My loose guide is this: half the weight of sugar as fruits…and then just adjust from there based on the sweetness of your fruits (i.e. you may want to add less sugar for mangoes and more for pear for example).

This new site is already starting to feel like home…and I hope you will soon feel that way too!