By August. The garden's final push. Made a big batch of green bean relish — Betty's recipe, the one she made for every church supper, green beans and onion and red pepper chopped fine and cooked in a vinegar-sugar brine and canned in half-pint jars. Green bean relish is not a dish anyone under sixty knows about and not a dish anyone under forty has eaten, but it's Appalachian to its core, a pickle that isn't a pickle, a relish that isn't a relish, a thing unto itself that goes on everything and belongs to a time when nothing was thrown away and everything was preserved and the pantry was the measure of a woman's preparedness.
Clay and Sarah went on vacation. A real vacation — five days at a cabin in the Smoky Mountains, the two of them, no VA group, no Thursday meeting (he found one near Gatlinburg), just two people in a cabin in the mountains. He sent me a picture of the view — mountains and mist and a sky that looked like it was posing for a painting — and I looked at the picture and thought: my son is on a mountain, in a cabin, with a woman, on purpose, for pleasure, and that sentence was impossible three years ago and is a photograph now.
There’s something about a week of canning — the steam, the jars lined up on the counter, the smell of vinegar brine — that makes you want to end it with something that has no purpose beyond tasting good. Clay sent that photograph from the mountain and I stood in my kitchen smelling like green beans and pickling spice and felt, for the first time in a long time, like everything was going to be fine. So I put the canning lids away and made a cobbler instead — peaches and blueberries, both of them at their last good moment of the season, baked under a butter crust the way the whole Appalachian summer deserves to be sent off.
Blueberry Peach Cobbler
Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cook Time: 45 minutes | Total Time: 1 hour | Servings: 8
Ingredients
- 3 cups fresh peaches, peeled and sliced (about 4 medium peaches)
- 1 cup fresh blueberries
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar, divided
- 1 teaspoon lemon juice
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup whole milk
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Instructions
- Preheat the oven. Heat oven to 350°F. Pour the melted butter into a 9x13-inch baking dish and set aside.
- Prepare the fruit. In a medium bowl, toss the sliced peaches and blueberries with 1/4 cup of the sugar, the lemon juice, and cinnamon. Let the fruit sit while you make the batter.
- Make the batter. In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, remaining 1/2 cup sugar, baking powder, and salt. Add the milk and vanilla extract and stir just until combined — a few lumps are fine. Do not overmix.
- Assemble the cobbler. Pour the batter directly over the melted butter in the baking dish. Do not stir. Spoon the fruit and all its juices evenly over the top of the batter. Again, do not stir — the batter will rise up around the fruit as it bakes.
- Bake. Bake uncovered for 40–45 minutes, until the top is golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center of the batter comes out clean. The edges will be deep golden and pulling slightly from the sides of the dish.
- Rest and serve. Let the cobbler cool for at least 10 minutes before serving. Serve warm, plain or with a scoop of vanilla ice cream or a spoonful of whipped cream.
Nutrition (per serving)
Calories: 275 | Protein: 3g | Fat: 11g | Carbs: 43g | Fiber: 2g | Sodium: 175mg