Easy Peezy Peach Cobbler

I hit the jackpot on Tuesday when I bought six peaches at Woodman's in Appleton.  This time, I got lucky!  These were just perfectly ripe, juicy and sweet.  I should have bought a lot more!  Yesterday, I googled for a peach cobbler recipe* and settled on this one.  (I think I may have been lured to it by the words "Southern Living".)  In the past, I have had peach cobblers made with more of a "biscuit dough" topping that made it more necessary to eat it when fresh and warm.  I find that THIS recipe yields a cobbler that is STILL so very good even the next day when it is NOT fresh from the oven and warm!

Yield:  10 servings

INGREDIENTS:

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 Tbs. baking powder
• Pinch of salt
• 1 cup milk
• 4 cups sliced peaches, peeled, OR unpeeled.  (I used five peaches.)
• 1 more cup of sugar
• 1 Tbsp. lemon juice
• Sprinkling of cinnamon or nutmeg, optional

DIRECTIONS:

1. Melt butter in a 13x9-inch baking dish.
2. Combine flour and first 1 cup of sugar, baking powder and salt.  Blend together.  
3. Add milk to above dry ingredients and stir only until everything is moistened.  Pour this mixture of batter evenly over the melted butter in the baking dish.  Do NOT stir it.  Set aside.
4. Bring to just a rolling boil the second cup of sugar, the four cups of peach slices and the lemon juice while stirring constantly.  It forms its own juice.
5. Remove boiling peach mixture from heat and spoon the hot mixture evenly over the thin batter in the baking dish.  Do not stir.
6. IF desired, sprinkle top very lightly with cinnamon OR nutmeg.
7. Bake at 375-degrees (or less if your oven runs hot) for 40-45 minutes or until golden brown on top.  Note:  I baked mine at 350-degrees for 40 minutes and it ended up as seen below.
8. Serve this cobbler while warm OR cold.

Above:  Shown with a very light sprinkling of 

cinnamon on top before baking.

* I followed the recipe just as I found it here:  http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/easy-peach-cobbler.  If you wish, you can go to that website and read through the 286 different "reviews" before you make one for yourself.

Fresh Plum Cobbler (Sort of!)

Watch it BUBBLE!!!!

And,... THEN,... HAVE A PIECE (with some ice cream)!!!!

This all started because my daughter Cheryl gave me a sack of fresh plums from their faithfully producing plum tree.   These aren't as large as the dark plums sold in grocery stores around here.  I would guess it takes two of these to equal one of the other.

Of the two varieties of plums she has, these were not the cling-free kind.  In other words, quite a bit of plum flesh WANTED to stick to its pit.  The recipe said to "pit the plums, and quarter them".   In this case, that wasn't a "neat" job.  As shown below, I first made the following cuts and then removed the flesh from the pit as good as I could.   (To make the cobbler, and because these plums were of the smaller kind, I doubled the number of plums called for.)

INGREDIENTS:

• Oven Temp:  375-degrees
• Baking Time:  40-45 Minutes, or until topping is brown and "bubbly".
• 9x9" baking pan or dish, sprayed with "non-stick".

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• 7 Large Plums (or 14 of the smaller type), pitted and quartered.
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

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• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/2 cup white granulated sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg (or mace, if you have it)

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• 1 egg, lightly beaten

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• 1/2 cup butter, melted

DIRECTIONS:

1. In a large bowl, combine the prepared plums, first 1/2 cup of brown sugar, 3 tablespoons flour and cinnamon.  Spoon this into a sprayed or greased 2-quart (or 9x9") baking dish.
2. In a small bowl, combine the next two sugar(s), baking powder, salt, nutmeg (or mace) and the last two cups of flour.
3. Add lightly beaten egg; stir with fork until mixed together and crumbly.  Sprinkle this mixture over the plum mixture. 
4. Drizzle top with melted butter.
5. Bake at 375-degrees for 40-45 minutes or until plums are tender and top is golden brown.   
6. Cool for at least 10-20 minutes before serving.   Serve warm or at room temperature.  (Ice cream  or whipped cream is a good addition.)
7. Yield:  About 8 servings.

Below:  Warm plum cobbler with 

"squirts" of whipped topping...

Blackberry Cobbler II

This morning, shortly after sunrise and while the dew was still on everything it could be on, my husband had an "appointment" with his brother... to go wild blackberry picking.  Yep, at 6 A.M.-- sharp!!   This morning's temperature in the low 50's felt better than the 80°  we have now that things have heated up a bit.  

What to do with the berries?   Well, a couple of things for the "first berries" of this season--  eat some fresh, put some in a bowl with milk/sugar, and... make a cobbler.  Fresh out of the oven, eat it as shown above, or,... add ice cream like this:

Serves 4
(This recipe is just a weeeeeeeee bit different than the other blackberry cobbler recipe I've posted on this blog.)

INGREDIENTS:

1 cup white sugar
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 and 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
...
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, melted
1 cup whole milk
...
2 cups fresh or frozen blackberries.  I used "fresh".
...
2 tablespoons more of white sugar (for sprinkling on top of batter before baking).  When sprinkling the sugar on top, try to stay away from the edges of the dish so that it will not "crystallize" around the hot sides of the glass baking dish.

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat oven to 350-degrees.  Spray a 3-quart baking dish with non-stick spray, or grease it with butter.  (You can double this recipe and bake it in a 9x13" glass baking dish for 60-65 minutes.)

In a medium bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients (sugar, flour, baking power and salt). 
Add the milk and melted butter to the combined dry ingredients; stir only until well blended.
Pour the batter into the baking dish.  
Rinse the blackberries and pat them dry.  Sprinkle the berries evenly on top of the batter.  Sprinkle the extra 2 tablespoons of sugar evenly over the berries.  
Bake until light brown and bubbling. For my oven, this was 50 minutes.   (You could sprinkle another tablespoon or so of sugar on top for about the last ten minutes of baking, as shown in the photo below--  BUT!, I do NOT think that's necessary!)

Eat plain, or top with whatever 

kind of "good stuff" you like!!!!

Blackberry Cobbler

M-m-m-m, good!

This morning, Wayne's brother, Jim, called and said he had something for us-- fresh blackberries, and fresh fish.  Who could resist that kind of invite to go over!?!?!?   This is what I did with some of the blackberries...

*INGREDIENTS*:

• 1/2 stick butter, melted, plus a bit more butter for greasing pan/dish.
• 3/4 cup granulated sugar (plus another separate 1/4 cup sugar for top,  and still another 1 tablespoon sugar for sprinkling on top just before removing from the oven).
• 1 cup self-rising flour 
• 1 cup whole milk (or low-fat milk with added whipping cream to equal a cup).
• 2 cups fresh (or frozen) blackberries.
• Ice cream or whipped cream for serving.

*DIRECTIONS*:

1. Preheat the oven to 350-degrees F.
2. Grease a 3-quart baking dish with butter.
3. In a medium bowl, whisk together 3/4 cup sugar with the flour and milk. 
4. Whisk in the melted butter.
5. Rinse the 'fresh' blackberries and pat them dry (if using frozen berries, let drain for a little while).
6. Pour the batter into the buttered baking dish.
7. Sprinkle the blackberries evenly over the top of the batter.
8. Sprinkle the 1/4 cup amount of sugar on top and bake until golden brown and bubbly (about 1 hour).   
9. Remove from oven and sprinkle the extra 1 tablespoon sugar on top and return to oven for about 10 minutes.
10. Let cool for about 30 minutes before serving with ice cream or whipped cream.

*The last time I made this, to make more servings, I doubled everything and baked it in a buttered 9x13" baking dish. Baking time was about 65 minutes before I removed and sprinkled the last bit of sugar on top for the next/last 10 minutes.

THANK YOU, JIM, FOR THE BLACKBERRIES!