Summer Picking: Peach Cobbler Pie

With peach season in full swing, it's hard to pass up the large, fresh peaches at the grocery store. And at $.99 per lb, it's even harder to not buy several.  While absolutely delicious on its own, my food blogs had an influx of peach desserts - from cooked peaches, peaches in cream to peach cobbler - and it was hard to resist making a sweet variation. Also, my folks were stopping by and I had an upcoming visit to my sister's so it was perfect timing to try a new recipe.

This recipe was a combination of a slew of cobbler recipes.  I made the filling based on what I thought would go well together.  Most variations I saw do not require you to cook the peaches on the stove - just toss together with the ingredients (juice, sugar, flour, etc.) - but since my peaches were incredibly firm, I needed to soften up the peaches before letting them bake in the oven.  If I had an orange, I would have added the juice and zest to the filling. 

The pie topping was courtesy of Liz, who providing her chuk apple crisp recipe. As for the melted butter on top of the butter, I omitted this and just sliced two slivers of butter and crumbled on top. My attempt to cut down on the butter...but really, what's another few slivers?

Peach Cobbler Pie

Makes 2 pies

Filling:

2 pie crusts (I get from frozen section)

12-15 large peaches (firmer peaches are better)

1 tbsp flour

Juice from 2 lemons

Zest from 2 lemon

1 tsp salt

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup brown sugar

2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp nutmeg (fresh if possible)

1/2 stick butter

1/4 cup heavy cream

Pie topping:

2 cups sugar

2 cups flour

1 tsp salt

2 tsp baking powder

2 eggs

1/2 cup melted butter (optional)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add a big dash of salt. Thoroughly wash the peaches. Add the peaches to the boiling water for approximately 1 minute. This will help you peel the skin off the peaches.

 

2. Drain the peaches immediately and put under the sink with cold water.  I briefly cover the peaches for a minute to help separate the skin. Then take off and let them cool enough to handle.  

 

3. Take a paring knife and start peeling the skin off the peaches. Cut the peaches into slices.

 

4. Zest and juice one lemon.  

5. In a pan large enough to hold the sliced peaches, melt the butter.  Once melted, add the flour. Mix well and then add in the sugar and brown sugar.  Don't worry, it will look dry and lumpy.

 

6. Add in the lemon juice, zest, salt and cream. 

7. Next, add in the peaches. Turn the heat to medium and mix well - making sure the peaches are covered in the sugar sauce. Let this cook down for a good 10 minutes on medium-medium low heat.

8. Add the cinnamon and the freshly grated nutmeg.  Take a quick taste and balance out the peaches if you need. More cinnamon, sugar, etc.  Turn off the heat and let it sit to cool just a bit.

9. While the peaches are simmering, make the pie topping. Combine the dry ingredients together.  Then crack an egg into the dry mixture and mix (chopsticks work well here) until crumbly.

10. Put the two pie crust onto a large baking sheet or on one each.  This will help ensure that no peach goodness seeps out of the pie and into the oven. Evenly distribute the peaches into two pie crusts. Top each of the pies with the dry mixture.  Take the melted butter and pour over the top.

 

11. Bake in the oven for 45 minutes. Check periodically to make sure the tops do not burn. You'll see that I made a mini cobbler in a ramekin as well - so that I could enjoy one immediately without having to destroy the entire pie for a taste. :)

12. Take out and let it cool.  If you are transferring and don't have a pie/cake container, a cardboard box does just fine. 

Peaches Divine

You may have noticed from my past comments that I consumed six peaches in one day. Three days later, I realized I ate a total of 14!  You haven't lived until you've eaten these "special" peaches.  My first time back to Taiwan, my dad's cousin's mom made these seasoned, marinated, pickled peaches with asian, salted dried prunes.  In fact, I'm eating a peach as I type.  Heaven. 

My dad, sister and I have a shared obsession with asian dried prunes as snacks. They can be dried prunes, olives, anything. They can be sweet or salty or even a little bit of both.  One of our favorites is this - it's a dried prune that is a bright brick red, salty and is delicious on its own, added to tomatoes, watermelon, mango or even drop a prune in a glass of Sprite.  For the tomatoes, cut the top hole out (basically the stem part you'd cut out anyways) making sure not to cut it all the way through.  Then you push one of these prunes down into the middle of the tomato - best with a very juicy large tomato (no romas) - and let it sit for a day.  Then you can just eat the tomato starting from the top and you get this delicious, salted, very flavorful tomato and juices.  You can find a variety in most Asian grocery stores.  Also, you can find dried prune powder - ooofffh! Sprinkle some on top of watermelon....so good.

So why hadn't we thought to use it with peaches until just a few years ago? I don't know but I'm so happy now!  These peaches are best if they are small and very hard.  Once you marinate these, they can get soft fairly quickly - but that's okay, because its so good, they are usually gone within the first few days.

Asian marinated peaches

6-8 asian, salted dried prunes, red version

4 tablespoons of asian, salted dried prune powder
2 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
8-12 small, very firm/hard peaches (soft ones will get too mushy after a few days)

1. Wash your peaches and bring a bit pot of water to a boil.  Once boiling, add in the peaches and let it cook for roughly 30 seconds. Very quick. Goal here is to get rid of that fuzzy outer layer or anything that is on the skin - prep so peaches have best absorbing/marinating power.

2. Transfer the peaches to a large ziploc bag and add in the sugar, salt, dried prunes and the powder.  Without closing the bag, roll the peaches/bag around so that it is incorporated and mixed well.  Taste and if it needs more powder or sugar, you can add.

3. Let it sit out on the counter with the bag OPEN to let the steam from the peaches out.  This is critical because you don't want to trap extra condensation from the heat of the boiled peaches and then get mushy peaches.  Once cool, zip it up and lay it on its side in the fridge for at least a day.  Putting it on its side is important so each peach can sitting in the juices created by the mix of peach juice, prunes and sugar  It will be good to rolls these around throughout the day so that all sides can absorb the flavors.  Peaches will start turning a pale red and start absorbing the yummy juices.  Just try and only eat one.  I dare you.