Nanny Ogg and the fruity apple fool

I am a huge fan of Terry Pratchett who writes the Discworld series; at least before Dementia hit him at an early age.  Who can resist vampires, dwarves, golems, witches, trolls and a talking dog? Not me that's for sure.  Mr Pickings and I often quote bits of Discworld to each other as we go about our business, including my personal fave "rat on a stick"!.  This can be used as an expletive or just general all-round useful phrase to express whatever you want.  One of the wonderful witches in the Discworld is Nanny Ogg, she of the many husbands and many children; a woman after my own heart who loves a good drink or 3.
Nanny Ogg has written a marvellous cookbook full of delightful recipes such as Dwarf Bread, and the afore-mentioned Sticky Toffee Rat Onna Stick.  And who could go past the wonderfully evocative Quattro Rodenti, a tasty pizza with- you guessed it- 4 rats!  Replace with tomatoes and cheese as you see fit.  I didn't want to chance such exotic fare so I just made Nanny's fruit fool.  Admittedly it is meant to be made with gooseberries but as they are not readily found in Brisbane, I figured tart apples would do the job instead.  I grabbed some Granny Smith apples, green and tart and great in cooking, and off I went to make apple fool - almost like Nanny Ogg's.

is clairvoyant gumbo in my future?  Only Mrs Gogol knows!

Ingredients:

3 medium apples (this will give you around 500g once peeled and cored)
90g caster sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 cloves
40ml apple liqueur mead (brandy, rum, or Calvados would do)
80g white chocolate
200mls whipping cream


Method:

Peel and core the apples, then dice them
Place in a medium saucepan with the sugar, vanilla, cloves and liqueur
Stir it and bring the mixture to a low boil
Simmer on a low heat for about 15-20 minutes till the apples are soft and squishy
Take out the cloves and let it cool right down
Puree with a stick blender

Melt the white chocolate in a microwave for 60-70 seconds
Let it cool for 5 minutes while you whip the cream till you have soft peaks

Gently fold in the apple puree and white chocolate into the whipped cream till all combined
Place into the fridge for at least a couple of hours so the flavours can mingle
Serve with extra grated chocolate if desired

So you get the picture- this is basically nothing like Nanny's gooseberry fool but it is delicious!  And you can probably see my brand-spanking new stick blender in these photos.  Yes I rushed out today to buy a new one (my old one died some weeks ago), and I love it to pieces.  It has all these attachments, and the whisk did its thing with the cream in about 20 seconds flat.  I just love it!

(stock image of the Prague Golem)