Peach Cobbler

Recipe here.  LOTS of other peach recipes here.

I am visiting my parents in New Jersey this week, and decided to make something tasty.  Peaches were on sale at the Trenton farmers' market, so I chose this Peach Cobbler from Tasty Kitchen.

I started by blanching the peaches.  "Blanching" is the process of putting something (usually fruit, veggies, or sometimes sweetmeats) in boiling water for a short time (references differ on whether it should be as short as 30 seconds, or as long as 2 minutes), then removing them immediately to an ice water bath to "arrest the cooking process" according to Joy of Cooking.  Blanching fruits and vegetables allows their skins to be removed easier than otherwise.  While I found this to be true-- some of the peach skins came off easily-- it was not entirely effective.  Some of the peach skins were still stuck on tightly, and it was a big hassle to remove them.  I ended up using a knife on most of them.  Anyway, once they were blanched and de-skinned, I sliced them and tossed with 2 tablespoons of sugar.

Millions of peaches...

I saved the skins and pits, by the way.  I'm not entirely sure what I will do with them, but I might try making peach juice or syrup or something with the remains.

Sorry James.  There went your house.

While I was doing all this blanching, peeling, and slicing, I had the butter in the pan in the oven.  I mixed up the batter real quick and poured it in.  It looked like this:

My mother's kitchen is much better equipped than mine!  Note the gas stove and miles of counter space above!

When the peaches were finally sliced and ready to go, I spread them out over the batter mixture.  Apparently you're not supposed to stir them in, so I didn't.

... peaches for me...

After 50 minutes in the 350 degree oven, it looked like this:

Ta-dah!

I then sprinkled some cinnamon, nutmeg, and ground cloves over the top... but I don't have a picture of that.  Just imagine the one above looking a little more brown, and smelling even more amazing.

Grade: B-.  Very tasty, but needs some improvements.  1.a) Use canned peaches because doing it this way was WAY too much work.  1.b)  Get better at blanching and/or removing peach skins.  2.  Add oatmeal to the batter, for a little extra chewiness.  3.  Mix the cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves into the batter, to achieve a more uniform spiciness.