Strawberry recipes from some of the UK's best chefs

1. Grease and line a 23cm round springform tin. In a bowl, combine crushed shortbread and melted butter and mix until well combined. Press mixture into the base of the cake tin, and smooth with the back of the smooth to ensure the base is flat and even. Refrigerate.
2. Prep the gelatine leaves according to pack instructions. Meanwhile, with a pestle and mortar, combine 50g of sugar with the basil leaves and grind to a fine green pulp. Add to a small bowl with the remaining sugar and whisk together. 
3. Next, in a stand mixer or with a handheld whisk, combine egg yolks, gelatine, cream cheese and basil sugar, and beat together on a medium to high speed for two minutes until thick. Before the mixture thickens completely, add in your melted white chocolate.
4. In a separate bowl, whisk cream until it reaches soft peaks and slowly fold into creamy cheese mixture one spatula at a time.
5. Remove tin from the fridge and add a layer of strawberry halves. Spoon over cheesecake mixture and ensure it’s evenly distributed and there are no air bubbles. Leave to set overnight.
6. When ready to serve, blend together strawberries and icing sugar with 50ml water for about 30 seconds.
7. Before serving, blend 150g strawberries with icing sugar and 50ml of water for 30 seconds. Drizzle over strawberry sauce, and garnish with basil leaves.

Cream cheese topping

1. In a bowl whip the double cream until you reach soft peak.
2. In a separate bowl combine the rest of the ingredients and mix well to incorporate together.
3. Fold through the soft peak double cream in 3 stages and once all is added you can whip until nice and thick.
4. Place the mixture into a piping bag and chill ready to finish your trifle.

Strawberry jelly

1. Place all of the ingredients into a pan except the gelatine, then bring to a gentle boil.
2. Remove the pan from the heat and cover with a lid or cling film and leave to infuse for at least 5 hours!
3. Pass the infused strawberry stock through a fine sieve and keep in the fridge until you make the jelly.
4. To make the jelly take 500g of strawberry stock and bring to the simmer, whilst this is happening soak 4 sheets of gelatine in cold water and once soft squeeze off the water and add to your warm strawberry stock to dissolve.
5. Leave this to cool slightly before making your trifle.

Set custard

1. Mix the milk and cream together in a saucepan.
2. Whisk together the sugar, egg yolk and birds custard until light and fluffy.
3. Pour over half the cold cream and milk mixture over egg mix to make a paste
4. Heat the rest of the milk and cream with vanilla in a saucepan.
5. Pour heated cream and milk over the egg paste mixture.
6. Return all the mix to pan.
7. Cook on low - medium heat until starts thickening.
8. To set the custard for the trifle take 1 litre of finished custard and heat gently to about 70/80c. Whilst this is happening soak 2 sheets of gelatin in cold water and squeeze any water off once soft then add to the warm custard to dissolve.
9. Let the custard cool to room temperature before adding to the trifle.

To finish and build the trifle

1. To build the trifle add some chopped strawberries to your dish then cover generously with the strawberry jelly liquid.
2. Chop the sponge fingers into 1 cm pieces and add a layer on to the jelly, the liquid jelly should soak into the sponge. Place the dishes into the fridge to set completely.
3. Once the jelly is set add a good layer of room temperature custard on top, about 1cm deep or more if you like, place into the fridge again to set firm.
4. Once the custard is set you can now pipe the whipped cream cheese mixture on top and make it as clean or as messy as you like!
5. Finish the trifle with 100s and 1000s and a little lemon zest.

For the mousse

• Heat the milk up in a pan to just under boiling. Remove from the heat and add the kernel oil.
• To make the Anglaise, strain the hot milk through a sieve into a saucepan then add the egg yolk, sugar and honey and cook on a low heat to 75°c or until the mixture thickens and leaves a clear path on the back of a spoon when a finger is drawn across. (will take around 5minutes - do not boil and stir constantly).
• Whilst cooking the anglaise put the gelatine leaves in a bowl with cold water to bloom.
• Once cooked remove from the heat, drain the gelatine leaves and mix well with the anglaise. Put the mixture in a bowl and chill in the fridge.
• Whisk the cream to soft peaks. Fold one third of the whipped cream in to the anglaise. Then add the rest of the cream making sure you don’t overmix.
• Chill the mousse until serving. (At least 2hours)

For the pumpkin seed crumb

• Combine all the ingredients together in a bowl. Mix until it all combines together in to a ball.
• Crumble the mixture onto a grease proof lined baking tray so you have little clusters of crumble. Bake at 160°c for 20 minutes or until golden brown

To make the tea granita

• Boil the water then add lemon, sugar, verbena and Darjeeling tea. Infuse for 4 minutes then pass through a sieve.
• Allow to cool, place into a 1 litre container and freeze. You will need to do this 6 hours before you make the dish.
• To macerate the strawberries: Remove the green from the strawberries then slice into quarters half. Put them in a large bowl and add the sugar and lime juice. Gently roll the strawberries over with a spoon. Do this 10 minutes before serving the dish to allow the sugar to soften and sweeten the strawberries.

To serve

• Start with a large dessert spoon of the kernel mousse in the middle of the plate. Arrange the macerated strawberries around the front of the mousse.
• Add the crumble mixture to the top of the mousse.
• Then get a fork and scrape the top of the granita so it creates crushed ice. Add a heaped tablespoon to the top of the dish just before serving.
• Garnish with lemon verbena leaves.