Using our Resources

We've been busy in the last couple months, as you know, so our usual habit of making a meal plan and shopping off of it has fallen by the wayside a bit. We still cook just mostly out of our pantry stash and occasional supplements of bread, fruit, veggies, milk and assorted other things from Target, but without true full blown shopping trips. While we're not formally participating it has sort of been our own "Eating Down the Fridge" project. Some results are tasty new or interesting things and most are just normal fare that I always am able to make from what we routinely keep in stock. My freezer is a bit emptier as is the pantry, but I do miss my meal plan and hope we get back on track soon. I think B has liked this interlude as it has featured pancakes for dinner about every other week and he is a big fan! Below is a recipe we had for brunch on Saturday making use both of the gifts from my family's farm and some things languishing in our freezer.

This is the fruit cobbler recipe I use and love. You may remember it from our Thanksgiving episodes where it appeared as blackberry for Zach and later Marionberry for my Grandpa. It is adapted with some tinkering from Mark Bittman's How To Cook Everything: Simple Recipes for Great Food
The original recipe is for Blueberry Cobbler. I've made it with many mixes of fruits both fresh and frozen. This weekend it was the frozen peaches and some frozen strawberries I found in the freezer.Due to pregnancy brain and a distracting two year old I forgot my usual cornstarch addition (not in the original recipe) and it ended up quite soupy, but still delicious. I recommend using it if you're used to a thicker sauce. I also get to use my brand new food processor my mom got for my birthday it is incredible!

Ingredients:

4 to 6 cups fruit, washed and thoroughly dried (cut into bite sized pieces if necessary)
1 cup sugar (to taste), divided
1-2 T. cornstarch
1/2 cup cold butter, diced
1/2 cup flour
pinch salt
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 egg
1/2 tsp. vanilla

- Butter 9in or so baking dish (I use an oval corning ware dish about 2.5 inches deep) and preheat oven to 375.
- Mix fruit with 1/2 cup sugar (or more to taste depending on the fruit) and cornstarch then place in the baking dish. Feel free to add more or less cornstarch depending on how thick you like your cobbler and the juiciness of the fruit you're using.
- Add flour, salt, 1/2 c. sugar and baking soda to food processor and pulse once.
- Add diced butter and process for 10 seconds
- Mix in egg and vanilla by hand.

Drop teaspoon fulls of the dough all over the surface of the fruit. It doesn't need to be neat or cover the entire surface as it spreads. Place in the oven for at least 40 minutes. I find it generally takes much longer - at least 50 minutes for the topping to cook through and perhaps an hour depending on if your fruit was frozen, your oven, etc. You can check with a toothpick or by dipping a spoon in. The crust should be golden all over and will be slightly crisp like a sugar cookie almost. The cobbler is quite delicious even if slightly under done though so no worries.