Peach Cobbler
When we made our list before the beginning of the year, we decided that we would try to make our fruit desserts when those fruits would be in season. We didn’t have our peach dessert on the calendar until July but, while grocery shopping this past week, I stumbled upon some peaches that felt perfectly ripe and smelled delicious. I took a chance and bought some hoping that we would either enjoy eating them raw or…bake something with them (not as part of our baking endeavor).
As it turns out, we ended up having a very unplanned weekend and those peaches came in handy. Aubrey has been searching for a job this summer and managed to finally get an interview last Wednesday. She got called back on Friday, was hired, and they scheduled her for Saturday, Sunday, and Monday from 4:00 until close. (Honestly, a little presumptuous on their part to assume she could start that quickly, considering it was a holiday weekend, but what can you do?) Well, there went our baking weekend!! Aubrey was still optimistic we could make our pre-planned selection on Sunday or Monday after her first night. By the second evening, she said we would make them on Monday. On Monday she told me she was going to “tag team” with Logan (my other daughter) for this week’s bake. I’m not going to spoil the “surprise” and give away what we were going to bake, but I will say it is something both of us have been dying to try for years. So, there was no way we were keeping the schedule as written.
We needed something to bake that would be quick because we were running out of time; it was already Monday. Enter the peaches! We had a “peach slump” on our list in July (Aubrey said I chose it) but it was too similar to the Tarte Tatin. After thinking about it, I liked the idea of the slump, I just wanted a more “cakey” topping rather than a biscuit or pastry. In my mind, that’s a cobbler and I proceeded to look for a recipe that fit that description.
It wasn’t an easy task. Most of the pictures didn’t show the topping close enough for me to determine whether the topping was a biscuit or cakey. Eventually, I was pretty sure I had found one based upon the picture and moved forward with the cobbler. I didn’t find it in any of our cook books because all of those recipes were like biscuits. I found it on a blog that I may look at again for other recipes. https://life-in-the-lofthouse.com/best-peach-cobbler/
The substitutions that we made for this recipe were as follows: Sola sugar substitute (my new favorite) in place of sugar and a mixture of flour instead of just all purpose (3/4 whole wheat flour and 1/4 all purpose).
Ingredients
- 3 cups sliced peaches fresh is best, but canned peaches works great too
- 2 Tablespoons + 1 cup granulated sugar divided
- 1/2 cup butter softened
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- pinch of salt
- pinch of nutmeg optional
- 1 large egg
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Directions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 2 quart baking dish with non-stick spray.
- Spread sliced peaches out in a single layer in prepared dish. Sprinkle tops of peaches with 2 Tablespoons sugar.
- In a medium bowl, with an electric hand-mixer, beat 1 cup sugar and softened butter together until combined. Add flour, baking powder, salt (and nutmeg if using). Mix. Then add in egg and vanilla. Continue to beat and mix together until just combined. (Batter will be the consistency of cookie dough batter.)
- Using a spatula, carefully spread batter over the tops of peaches. Trying to spread out as evenly as you can and covering most of the peaches. (I use my hands to help spread it too.)
- Bake in preheated oven for 35 to 40 minutes or until crust is golden brown. Remove from oven and let stand 5 to 10 minutes before serving. Enjoy with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream!
Our Experience
Luckily, this is a really easy dessert (would be even easier if you used canned or frozen peaches).
To get the peaches ready, I decided to blanch them to get the peel off. I absolutely love peaches but I could do without the skin. I almost always peel them whether I’m baking with them or eating them raw and my preferred method is blanching if I am going to be peeling a lot of them. Since I was going to be baking these, I probably left them in the boiling water a little longer than I usually do and I didn’t cool them off either.
Once they were peeled, I just sliced them off the pit rather than halve them and slice from there. They didn’t want to come off of the pits very easily and I didn’t want mashed peaches. The recipe called for 2 T sugar to be sprinkled on the peaches in the pan but I figured that would be too sweet for me so I used a scant tablespoon.
Now that the peaches were all done, it was time to make the topping/batter. It went together very quickly. We creamed the butter and sugar, added the dry ingredients, then the wet and we were done.
The batter was pretty thick so we dumped it all out on top of the peaches and planned to spread it out once it was all in the pan.
When it comes to serving, I would normally say to just scoop it out by the spoonful. However, since I am the only person eating this I need to have it portioned out so I know how many calories I’m getting per serving. (Approximately 190 calories per serving, if cut into 6 servings.) So, our cobbler is cut like a pie even though it shouldn’t be!
What we liked.
Since I am the only one who likes peach desserts, I am the only person in the house to give a thorough review. Aubrey, Garret, and Logan tasted it but neither ate more than a bite. Nobody was a fan! Peaches aren’t their thing I guess.
Guess what? I really liked it…not surprised. 🙂 Luckily, I had found a cobbler that had the cake like topping I was looking for…I loved that! I really like the earthy, heartiness that whole wheat flour brings to baked goods and this dessert was no exception. I didn’t think the texture was affected either; meaning it wasn’t heavy or dense. The peaches had such good flavor for this time of year! So glad I bought them. They were mostly sweet but had just a little bit of tartness that was needed in this dessert. I am positive other fruits could be used with this topping; maybe cherries next time.
What we would change.
I like my fruit desserts to be a bit tart so I would change the sweetness of this cobbler (if you like sweeter desserts, I doubt you would want to change anything). It always depends on the sweetness of the fruit but these peaches were so sweet, I don’t think I would put any sugar directly on the peaches. I might also reduce the sugar in the topping a little (maybe to 3/4 cup instead of 1) especially since the fruit was so sweet. Now, if I were to use tart cherries, the sugar amounts might be just fine as they are. We added the nutmeg and I didn’t taste it at all so, if you want that flavor to shine, I would suggest doubling it. Some people like to add almond extract to peaches which would work in this dessert if that’s a flavor profile you prefer. Finally, I could have doubled the amount of peaches and been perfectly satisfied with it. As it was, there was more topping than peaches.
What we learned.
We (Logan and I) learned how to bake together, which was nice. Aubrey and I have a certain rhythm in the kitchen now and it was different working with someone else. We had fun baking together and I appreciated her help even though she knew she probably wasn’t going to be eating any of it.
Until next week, Happy Baking!