This is an absolutely delicious way to enjoy apricots, which are pretty special fruit anyway; it's lusciously sweet and delightfully fragrant. The poached apricots can be served warm or cold, so it is an easy dish to make in advance. It makes a litre of ice cream so you’ll have some left over

For the apricot ice cream:-

700g ripe apricots, halved and stoned

120g caster sugar

300ml cream

For the pistachio sugar dust:-

1 tbsp shelled pistachios

1 tbsp granulated sugar

Oven poached apricots:-

8 whole large apricots, halved or 12 whole small ripe ones

2 small sprigs of lemon verbena

2 tbsp sweet white wine eg. Muscat

• First of all make the ice cream by putting the apricots, sugar and 75ml water in a large saucepan. Cover, bring to the boil and simmer for 12 minutes or until very soft. Allow to cool, then blitz until very smooth. Stir in the cream. Either freeze in containers, stirring half way through the process, or use an ice cream maker

• To make the pistachio dust, either whiz together in spice mill or grind in a pestle and mortar until gritty

• Pre heat the oven to 180C. Line a baking tray lined with foil. Let the foil overhang in all directions. Spread the apricots out evenly, and place the verbena springs on top. Spoon over the wine. Bring the foil up over the apricots to make a tent and seal so that the steam can’t escape. Bake for 12-15 minutes until just softened but not falling apart. Allow to cool a little, then serve with the ice cream and sprinkle over the pistachio sugar dust