10 recipes to cook in August

August is an incredible month for British fruit, and Adam Bennett’s dessert is a great way to use two of the most versatile fruits that the UK has to offer. The combination of delicately poached peach, ice-cold strawberry granita and tangy crème fraiche is the perfect summer treat. As an aside, Adam suggests a grown-up twist which involves marinating the strawberries in either strawberry or peach liqueur.

Graham Campbell’s dish explores the intriguing combination of halibut and pea. Halibut is a very light fish, and Graham cleverly ensures that the different elements of pea (mousse and sorbet) don’t overwhelm its delicate flavour. Peas are at their best throughout the summer, but especially during the month of August. Although more time-consuming than some of the other recipes on this list, this subtly flavoured dish is well worth the effort for a dinner party.

Often overlooked for more popular berries, Chris Mosler’s cheesecake brings the humble redcurrant back into the limelight. The biggest issue cooks have when working with redcurrants is their sourness, but Chris turns this flaw into a strength, as the rich, creamy cheesecake filling is juxtaposed by the tangy redcurrant ripples. Sat on a buttery biscuit base, this decadent dessert is the perfect way to end a summer meal.

Alan Murchison’s dish perfectly encapsulates the feeling of a summertime seaside holiday, expertly pairing rich, meaty trout with salty clams and fresh sea vegetables. You can’t get more seasonal than this as trout, spinach and chard are at their best during August. Furthermore, Alan’s use of samphire is especially seasonal as it is only available for a few months in the summer.

Sausages are almost exclusively cooked on the barbecue in summer, but Ollie Templeton’s recipe shows that sausages are more than simple grill fodder. His sausages need a couple of days to cure and dry – so make sure you plan ahead – but the results are absolutely worth it. The process is actuallys easier than you may think – just mix the sausage ingredients, rest a little, then fill the casings (with either a stuffer or a simple funnel). The sausages are then roasted and served with a light emulsification of peas, lettuce and mint, with a final sprinkling of Berkswell cheese.

Damsons come into season in late August – keep an eye out for damson trees with ripe purple fruit, they’re very common all over the British countryside! Though damsons contain a lot of sugar, they’re also highly astringent – they need cooking to release the sugars, otherwise they’ll be very tart. Louise Robinson breaks her damsons down into a fruity sauce, which is then rippled through softly whipped cream and earthy hazelnut meringue pieces.

Blackberries are among the latest of the summer fruits – they don’t usually rear their heads until late August, but when they do they appear in their droves, sprouting forth from hedgerows all over the country. This blackberry and lemon upside-down cake is one of the first things we make with our first blackberry haul – line the bottom of your cake tin with blackberries, pour over a lemon sponge batter and bake for forty five minutes. Simple, delicious and summery.