Cherry clafoutis on a kamado

Published 10 September 2026 · Last updated 10 September 2026 · By Ben Austen

Ingredients

• The batter, from Raymond Blanc's cherry clafoutis recipe on BBC FoodEggs, sugar, flour and milk. The quantities are his and I cooked them as written, so go and get them from him rather than from me. What I changed is where it cooked.
• 2 tins Cherries in syrupKeep the syrup. Reduced down it becomes the best part of this, and it is not in the recipe I was working from.
• about 1 tsp VanillaVanilla, not vanilla purée. No brandy and no kirsch went in.
• about 1/4 tsp Almond essence
• Butter and caster sugar, for the dishThe sugar against the hot metal is where the caramelised edge comes from.

Equipment

• A barbecue that will hold around 180°C (350°F) indirect, with the lid downI cooked this on my Big Green Egg Large with the ConvEGGtor (ceramic deflector) in, so the heat came from underneath rather than straight at the dish. A kettle with the coals banked to the sides will do the same job. An oven will bake it too, but you lose the charcoal side of it.
• An oven-safe dishMine is enamelled steel, the same one I use for apple crumble. Ceramic is fine. So is a metal tin. Butter it and dust it with caster sugar whatever it is made of.
• A pan for the syrupMine reduced on the hob indoors while the clafoutis was on the fire.

Method

1. Get the fire going and put the deflector in
2. Butter the dish and dust it with caster sugar
3. Make the batter to Raymond Blanc's recipe, and add the vanilla and the almond essence
4. Get the dome to 180°C (350°F) before it goes anywhere near the fire
5. Dish on, lid down, and leave it
6. While it's on, reduce the cherry syrup
7. Take it out and get the syrup over it quickly

Key takeaways

• It looked wrong and it tasted right, and those are two different things. It never rose properly, so the texture was a bit eggy. The taste was the part that worked. The fire flattered the butter and the sugar in a way an oven doesn’t.
• It went on too cool and I think that’s why it went flat. It wanted 180°C (350°F) and it went on nearer 150°C (300°F). It did puff up while it was in there, and then it dropped the moment it came out.
• The batter quantities are Raymond Blanc’s, not mine. They’re on BBC Food and I cooked them as written. What I changed is where it cooked.
• Use tinned cherries and keep the syrup. Two tins of syrup reduced down on the hob goes thick and very sweet, and it goes over the top at the end. Mine had some spare and it ended up glazing a batch of wings a few days later.
• You don’t need a kamado. You need something that will hold 180°C (350°F) with the lid down and the heat coming from underneath rather than straight at the dish. A kettle with the coals banked to the sides does it.

The cook

1. Get the fire going and put the deflector in. I was cooking a tomahawk steak after this and that needed the Egg a lot hotter, so the clafoutis went on first. Once a ceramic is up at searing heat you have a job bringing it back down again. There was no smoking wood on this cook. I meant to put oak on and forgot, so everything the fire gave it came from the lump charcoal.
2. Butter the dish and dust it with caster sugar. The sugar against the hot metal is where the caramelised edge comes from.
3. Make the batter to Raymond Blanc’s recipe, and add the vanilla and the almond essence. Drain the cherries and keep the syrup in a jug. Cherries in the dish, batter over them.
4. Get the dome to 180°C (350°F) before it goes anywhere near the fire. This is the step I got wrong. Mine went on nearer 150°C (300°F) and I don’t think it ever recovered from that.
5. Dish on, lid down, and leave it. Mine went on at 16:23 and came off just after 17:00, so a bit over forty minutes. The dome climbed to 180°C and on towards 200°C (350–390°F) while it was in there, and that didn’t hurt it. A batter pudding sets across a wide range.
6. While it’s on, reduce the cherry syrup. Two tins of syrup into a pan on the hob, and let it go until there is hardly anything left and what’s there is thick.
7. Take it out and get the syrup over it quickly. Mine puffed up properly in the dish and then dropped almost as soon as it came out into the air.

What to serve the clafoutis with

A spoonful of the reduced cherry syrup over a warm slice is what I would do again.

What I learned

It went on too cool. It wanted 180°C (350°F) and it went on nearer 150°C (300°F), and I think that’s the whole of it. It did puff up in there, and then it dropped as soon as it came out and went really flat. Next time it doesn’t go near the fire until the dome is properly up.

What it cost me was the texture. It came out a bit eggy, because it never set the way it should have, and it fed fewer people than it would have done if it had held its height. What it didn’t cost me was the taste. That was the part that worked, and it worked better than it would have done indoors.

Variations

An oven will bake this and it will probably look better than mine did. What it won’t do is the charcoal side of it, and on this cook that was most of what made it worth eating.

Related

• Big Green Egg Large review — the unit this was baked on.
• Apple crumble on a kamado — same dish, same indirect setup, hotter dome.
• Barbecued peaches on a kamado — another fruit pudding on here.
• Basque cheesecake on a kamado — another pudding baked indirect, at 220°C (428°F).

Questions

Why did my clafoutis go flat?

Mine went flat because it went on too cool, nearer 150°C (300°F) when it wanted 180°C (350°F). It puffed up while it was in there and dropped as soon as it came out. Get the dome properly up before the dish goes on, and you should keep the height.

Can you bake a clafoutis on a barbecue at all?

Yes, and the fire gives it something an oven doesn’t. You need it indirect, with a deflector or the coals banked to the sides, holding around 180°C (350°F) with the lid down.

Do you need fresh cherries?

I used tinned, two tins of them, and I’d use tinned again, because the syrup that comes with them makes the best part of this. UK cherry season is over by early August, so anything fresh in late summer is imported anyway.

What dish should I use?

Enamelled steel worked fine for me and it’s the same dish I use for a crumble. Ceramic is fine. Butter it and dust it with caster sugar whatever it’s made of.

Provenance and disclosure

I cooked this on my own Big Green Egg Large. Smoke and Lump has no commercial relationship with Big Green Egg, with the BBC, or with Raymond Blanc, and earns nothing from this recipe.

Sourced from the 25 August 2026 cook log — a cherry clafoutis and a tomahawk steak on the same fire, the pudding first while the dome was still low.