It's cobbler season, when the fruit is at its peak and so is the heat and humidity. The last thing anybody wants to do is go in the kitchen, never mind a kitchen with an oven turned on. Still, Southern cooks will brave the heat for a cobbler just about any time, and after all, we don't have to stay in the room with it while it's baking.
This year cobbler season came just after I'd discovered that there was an actual, positive culinary reason for cinnamon-flavored whiskey to exist: it's the perfect flavoring for a lot of summer fruit, especially blueberries and stone-fruits such as peaches.
My husband unaccountably likes that stuff in the wintertime and we'd been given a huge bottle of it. The thing has been languishing in the liquor cabinet for several years until earlier this summer when I was rummaging around for a liqueur to add to a fresh blueberry sauce. I laid my hand on the bottle to move it out of the way, but then the light went on: whiskey and cinnamon are frequent flavorings for cooked fruit in my kitchen. Hmmm.
It not only worked, it was lovely—and lent the flavor without the dark color that ground cinnamon brings to the pot. Last night, a few spoonfuls added to the season's first peach cobbler really made it sing.
Peach Cobbler
The version of cobbler that I grew up on was thick with fruit, almost soupy with juice, and encased only on the top and sides with a raised, biscuit-like pastry, often with a layer of pastry at its center that bakes to a dumpling-like consistency. I've never really warmed to any of the others, especially those things with the batter that rises to form a cakey crust. Nowadays, I actually prefer a regular pastry and omit the middle layer that bakes into a dumpling.
Serves 4 to 6
5-6 large, ripe peaches
Sugar
½ large lemon
2 lightly rounded tablespoons corn starch
3 tablespoons cinnamon flavored whiskey (Fireball), or 3 tablespoons bourbon and ground cinnamon to taste
Whole nutmeg in a grater
4 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into bits
1 recipe Basic Pastry (recipe follows)
Vanilla ice cream, for serving (optional)
1. Position a rack in the center of the oven and preheat the oven to 375° F. Gently wash the fruit under cold, running water and drain well. Stem, peel, halve, and pit them. Cut them into thick wedges and cut each wedge into small chunks, putting them into a large mixing bowl as you go. You'll need at least 5 cups—a little more won't hurt a thing. Squeeze in the juice from half a lemon, and sprinkle them with sugar to taste (about half a cup—but more if the fruit isn't very sweet). Sprinkle in the cornstarch and a light grating of nutmeg. Gently toss to mix and add the flavored whiskey or bourbon and cinnamon to taste and bits of butter, toss gently, and set aside.
2. Lightly flour a work surface and roll out half the dough to a thickness just under 1/8-inch. Cut enough of it into 2-to-2½-inch-wide strips to line the sides of deep 2-to-2½-quart casserole. Cut the remaining dough into somewhat narrower strips (about 1¼-to-1½-inches wide), then roll out the remaining half of the dough and cut it into the narrower strips. Line the sides of the dish with the wider strips and pour in the prepared fruit. Cover the top by making a basket weave pattern with the narrower strips of dough, trim the excess from the sides, and cut any leftover strips in half lengthwise and cover the edges with them.
3. Put the dish on a rimmed cookie sheet and bake in the center of the oven for 20 minutes or until the crust is beginning to color. Turn the pan and continue baking until the crust is golden brown and the filling is bubbly at the center, about 40 minutes more. Serve warm with ice cream, if liked.
Basic Pastry
This is my basic all-purpose pie dough—flaky, tender and buttery but not heavy. It's basically a classic French pâte brisée, and the secret to its tenderness is lard (rendered pig fat). If you are not able to cook with lard or can't get any of decent quality where you live, use vegetable shortening. It isn't nearly as good but still works reasonably well.
A food processor makes short work of this, and does a superior job so long as you don't over-process it.
Makes two 9-inch pie shells or one 9-inch pie with top crust:
10 ounces (about 2 cups) Southern soft-wheat flour or pastry flour
½ teaspoon salt
¼ pound (8 tablespoons, 1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into ¼-inch chunks
1 ounce (2 tablespoons) lard, cut into small chunks
About ½ cup ice water
1. Put the flour and salt in a processor fitted with a chilled steel blade. Pulse it a few times to sift it, then add the butter and lard cut into bits. Pulse the machine until the flour resembles coarse meal—the texture of raw grits or polenta, the largest bits no bigger than small peas. If you are mixing by hand, put the flour and salt in a metal or ceramic bowl and whisk to blend them together. Add the butter and lard and cut it into the flour with a pastry blender, fork, or 2 knives.
2. Add ¼ cup of water and pulse to mix it in (or mix it in by hand with a fork). Pulse or mix in additional water by tablespoonfuls until the dough just begins clumping together. It should be moist and no longer crumbly but not sticky or wet. Gather it into a ball, lightly dust it with flour, wrap it well with plastic wrap, and flatten it into a ½-inch thick disk. Chill for half an hour before rolling it out.