It All Comes Back to Cobbler

I had intended to write an altogether different post today...one that lamented my absence from the kitchen and featured lovely photos of all the restaurant food we've eaten in the past few weeks. Yep, I was all set to write a post telling you that I was feeling about cooking pretty much how Millie looks in that photo above...blah. Oh and I was going to tell you that when we aren't eating in restaurants, we're just noshing on lots of cheese plates.

I was pretty much going to write that.

But then, lo, a holiday weekend rolled around, and, well... I cooked. I cooked a lot. Yes, hot dogs were one of the things I cooked, and clearly that doesn't count as cooking, but I also made a fantastic corn, jalapeno, feta salad and a yummy tomato, cucumber salad, and a nice pasta dish, and a really stellar (if I do say so myself) peach, raspberry cobbler. So alas, there will be no restaurant photos today.

At some point this weekend, I also realized that I stopped cooking right at my 100th post on this blog... Strange, no? And in looking back over the archives during a mild bout of insomnia, I also discovered that almost exactly one year to the day, I was making, wait for it, peach cobbler.

Hmm...

Really I have nothing to conclude from all of this, except to say, we're cooking again, which is good. Oh and I would highly recommend this cobbler.

Peach Raspberry Cobbler -- Adapted from the Joy of Cooking


Filling

• 7 -9 medium peaches
• 2 cups of raspberries
• 1/4 cup of sugar

Topping

• 1 cup all-purpose four
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/8 teaspoon vanilla
• 4 tablespoons butter softened
• 1/3 cup of sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/4 cup buttermilk
  

Cut peaches into even slices and cover the bottom of an oval baking dish evenly. Top with the raspberries and evenly sprinkle fruit with the 1/4 cup of sugar. Set aside.

Wisk together thoroughly the flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon.

In a separate bowl, beat the butter, vanilla and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg and then add half the dry ingredients and beat on low until just incorporated.

Beat in the buttermilk and then add the remaining dry ingredients until the batter is just smooth.

Spoon the batter evenly over the fruit mixture and cook for about 35 minutes on 350. Let cool for at least 15 minutes before serving.

Small Bites

I was so honored to contribute to perfection that is the Autumn Small Magazine.

Take a peek at my recipe for "blueberry dessert" (original name, no ;-)

Mango Salsa

Amidst all the hoopla of the weekend, we did manage to eke out one home cooked meal. Tired from our little road trip, I didn't want to try to make anything too extravagant for Sunday dinner, so I had Bryan throw some chicken from Whole Foods on the grill (maybe it's psychological, but I think organic, free range, hormone free chicken tastes so. much. better. than conventional chicken... I'm just saying.)

While he was grilling, I made a quick pot of beautiful rice, this time adding slivered almonds, and threw together my mom's famous mango salsa, since I had all of the ingredients on hand. This is incredibly easy and is good with chicken, pork, fish tacos, or on its on as a little summer salad.

Mango "Salsa"
Serves 4

Mix together the following in a medium size bowl and let sit in the refrigerator for one hour before serving.

• 1 large ripe Mango -- diced
• 1 pint grape or cherry tomatoes -- quartered
• 1/4 cup finely chopped cilantro
• juice from one small lime
• sea salt + pepper to taste

I also like to top with a little crumbled feta, goat or queso fresco, depending on what I'm serving. Alongside last night's chicken and rice, I went with goat cheese.

Audrey totally dug the chicken, but sadly refused the beautiful rice and mango salsa, and instead had a piece of corn on the cob and some orechiette with parmesan... Oh well.

Weekend Food

Sadly, there won't be a lot of cooking around our place this weekend. We're headed to a block party at the museum tonight and to an all-day birthday/house cooling party tomorrow + we have a fridge full of leftovers to plow through.

Funny, a few months ago a couple of days out of the kitchen would have been a relief, but now I'm a bit sad...I always look forward to weekend cooking.

So let me live vicariously through you. What are you whipping up this weekend?

In other news, my Friday post is up on Renegade Bus. Go pick some berries this weekend and then put them on top of Alice Water's 1234 cake!

Alice Water’s 1234 Cake with Lemon Curd and Blueberries

Adapted from “The Art of Simple Food” by Alice Waters

Yield One nine-inch, two-layer cake

Ingredients

• 4 eggs, separated
• 1 cup milk
• 3 cups cake flour (sift and then measure)
• 4 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsweetened butter, softened
• 2 cups sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
  

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter two 9-inch baking pans and line the bottom of each with parchment paper. Butter the paper and dust the pans with flour, tapping out the excess.

Stir baking powder and salt into cake flour.
In another bowl, beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the four egg yolks one at a time. Add the vanilla to the mixture.

Add the flour mixture and milk alternately, starting and ending with one third of the flour. Stir just until the flour is incorporated.

In another bowl, whisk egg whites to soft peaks. Stir one third of the egg whites into the batter, then gently fold in the rest. Pour the batter into the prepared pans and bake until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, 30 to 40 minutes.

Let cake cool and then spread lemon curd between the two layers. Serve with slightly crushed fresh, local blueberries and loosely whipped cream.

Progress!

I finally got Audrey to eat warm fruit in the form of peach cobbler... Read about it over here at the Small magazine blog Smaller

The Game Changer

What I’m about to admit may hurt a few of you. I expect you may feel a bit like I did when I discovered my husband (who has otherwise great taste in food) doesn’t like olives and stinky blue cheese. I was crestfallen, perhaps even a smidge devastated. Olives and stinky blue cheese are two of my all-time favorite foods. But I digress (perhaps delaying the confession?).

Here goes; I’m not crazy about avocados.

There I said it. I don’t hate them per say, I’m just not really a fan -- I don’t buy them and when they come on something I've ordered, I bequeath them to someone who actually enjoys them… that sort of thing. And with guacamole, I’m mezzo mezzo. I would never make it or order it, but if it’s already on the table, I’ll dip a few chips in.

But recently there’s been a change. A few months ago, my friend Stephanie showed up at a party toting some homemade guacamole specked with feta cheese. I dipped the corner of a chip in and was completely intrigued... In the days after the party, I couldn’t get it out of my mind and set out to re-create my own version at home.

After a little experimenting, I came up with the following simple and foolproof recipe, and I have to say (all modesty aside) it’s amazing… Truly.

I highly recommend giving it a whirl this weekend.

p.s. – yes this is the same guacamole that set off Audrey’s "gag fest 2009". Don’t hold that against it…you know we’re working on her taste buds here.

Guacamole with Feta Cheese

• 3 ripe (preferably organic) Haas avocados
• One small container crumbled feta cheese
• 1 lemon
• Sea salt, fresh ground pepper and Spike to taste
• 1 medium diced tomato (preferably local + organic) *
• 1 small Vidalia onion *
• About ¼ cup finely chopped cilantro *
  

* I often substitute the above three ingredients with the better part of a container of Whole Foods Pico De Gallo. It’s perfection.

The assembly couldn’t be easier, I just dice my avocado, squeeze in the lemon, add the feta and the pico and smash it all together with a fork. Then I add in my salt, pepper and Spike to taste and smash a little more.

A Set Back

I had this grand scheme last night.

Here was my thinking: I could magically displace any squeamishness Audrey has about the core ingredients of a particular dish (i.e. warm fruit), and she would happily lap it up with abandon, if she made said dish herself.

+ I wanted something sweet, and I’ve recently instituted a rule that we can only eat sweets if we make them ourselves -- from scratch (in an attempt to both eat fewer sweets and curb our serious addiction to boxed Ghirardelli double chocolate brownie mix...)

So while Millie and Bryan were happily ensconced in her room playing some combination of princess and the hokey pokey (don’t ask), Audrey and I set out to make berry crumble.

We sort of improvised our way through it, forgoing a formal recipe, and true to plan, I had her do almost all of the work while I guided her through the process. I also took this time to tell her about the blog… how I wanted to cook together more and for her try new foods and then write about them so we could remember it all when we’re older.

She was way into it, and I was positive she would love the crumble; you can see where this is going, no?

We let it cool, made some lightly sweetened loosely whipped cream to pile on top, and she dove in. Friends, it was way, way worse that the great guacamole debacle. She completely freaked out. It was epic: the gagging, the crying, the pleading for water… From her totally overblown reaction, you would have thought I’d just fed her the contents of her sister’s diaper.

“Don’t worry mom”, she managed to say after recovering from her meltdown extraordinaire. “You can just say I didn’t like it on the blog…”

She didn’t like it.

But I did… A lot.

Berry Crumble

• One cup of organic blueberries
• One cup of organic raspberries
• ½ tsp of fresh lemon juice
• 1 tbsp of sugar in the raw
• 1 tbsp whole wheat flour
• ½ cup oatmeal (not quick oats)
• ½ cup all purpose flour
• ½ tsp cinnamon
• ½ cup brown sugar
• ¼ cup crushed pecans or walnuts
• ½ stick of butter chilled and diced into cubes

Pre-heat oven to 350.

In one bowl mix berries, lemon juice, sugar in the raw and whole wheat flour gently with a wooden spoon or spatula, evenly distribute berry mixture into 4 ramekins.

In another bowl mix together oatmeal, all-purpose flour, cinnamon, brown sugar and nuts, add in chilled butter cubes and crumble together with fingers, cover the berries in each ramekin with the crumble mixture.

Place ramekins on a cookie sheet and bake for approx 30 minutes or until bubbly, let cool and serve with vanilla ice cream or lightly sweetened, loosely whipped cream.

Top Ten

Yesterday Audrey and I documented all the "healthy" foods she loves the most. We thought this would be a good way to come up with new combinations and give us ideas for things we can try out that are similar to what already tastes good to her... Baby steps.

Audrey's Top Ten:

1. Nectarines/Peaches
2. Strawberries
3. Blueberries
4. Wheat penne with butter and fresh Parmesan cheese
5. Her dad's "crispy chicken"
6. Corn on the cob (and cornbread, more on this later)
7. Steak
8. Mashed potatoes
9. String cheese
10. Cinnamon toast on wheat bread

We really need to work on the green veggies...not a single one on the list.

What are your kid's favorites?