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Plan Z Phase: This is a Z3 (ZReboot) recipe.

For anyone wondering if Chris, VP Anger eats cake, the answer is not very often; and never a whole piece. Chris’s favorite flavor is lemon, so for over 30 years now I have made him a new lemon dessert every year for his birthday. Has there ever been a lemon cake? Sure. Has there been one since the inception of Plan Z? Nope.

This super-simple, light and dreamy dessert is easy enough for a weeknight treat and fancy enough to serve to a dinner party. As it’s portioned out here, it’s not a large dessert. People compliment me all the time now on how I serve smaller desserts after a dinner party. They appreciate a nice, light treat instead of a big piece of cake.

Little kids will lap this up like an ice cream sundae!

Servings: Serves 4 or can easily be doubled for larger portions or 8 smaller portions like the one pictured

Ingredients:

• 8 ounces of whole milk ricotta (find it by the cottage cheese)
• 2 – 4 tsp of Swerve or Zsweet sugar substitute. You can also use Truvia but these taste slightly better.  You put in the amount based on your tastes so start with less and see if that does it for you and your guests. You can always add more.
• 1 tsp of finely grated citrus zest. You can use lemon or orange.  Use your mandolin or rasp to grate it very fine
• 1 quart of ripe strawberries
• 3 Tbl of red jelly or jam.  Try to find one with no sugar or that is simply fruit.  There is a brand called Simply Fruit or the sugarless ones will be flavored with Splenda (sucralose).  I try not to use Splenda but just a bit once in a while is okay.   For this dish I used a locally made jam that was just strawberries and guava.  No sugar.
• 1 Tbl of orange liqueur (or water if you don’t cook with alcohol) I used Cointreau or you can also use Grand Marnier

Instructions:

In a medium bowl add the ricotta, the sweeteners and the zest. Mix with your electric mixer until fluffy. This will take less than a minute.

Spoon your mixture into serving dishes. I have antique champagne glasses. You can also find cute little bowls at Cost Plus or thrift stores.  The whole idea is for a smaller portion but fill the vessel nicely.

If you are not going to serve it right away, my trick is to cover the containers with little zip lock baggies. You can even re-use the baggies later.

When ready to serve, you’ll put on your compote.

To make the compote, clean and chop your strawberries into bite-sized chunks. You can save a few beautiful strawberries for garnish if you’d like. In a small sauce pan add the liqueur and the jam/jelly. Heat until boiling. Stir regularly and just bubble for about 10 seconds to boil off the alcohol. Let it sit until it cools down a bit.

Put the strawberry chunks in a bowl and pour over the sauce. Stir until they are all glazed. You can serve right away by spooning the sauce over the creamy mixture or you can refrigerate the sauce until later for serving. The sauce will still taste good the next day but it will become watery as you leave it in the bowl overnight. That’s because the strawberries will release their juices. Still tastes just great; just not shiny and glistening anymore.

Enjoy!

Cheers,