Simmer Till Done

Toward the end of a community board meeting, a woman was invited to the podium to describe her recent trip to Japan. She’d gone on a cultural exchange, and though the board members were slouched and glancing at watches, she began: “It was beautiful.” Slouched in my own chair I thought, yes, beautiful. Now on to the bridges and temples and orange fish. “It was really beautiful,” she said. Yes, I’d heard that. “It was.” This went on, starting with “Everything was so nice…” and ending with “…a wonderful experience.” She was a lovely person who’d clearly enjoyed her trip, but what had we learned? That Japan was beautiful, and nice, and she had a wonderful time.

Writing experts would say she was telling, not showing. Why was it nice? Did her Kyoto hosts present her with a yellow origami-wrapped book while crossing a carved red bridge at dawn? Because that would be nice. She of the generalized journey might have benefited from an old-fashioned slide show because something – if not someone – must bring a story to life.

Most of the food I share here on Simmer comes with a story. But what if there is no story? If I make something new with no taste of history, I find myself like our details-challenged traveler, vaguely at the surface, story-less, but glad that with little to tell I am, at least, oh-so-grateful to show.

I made up a scone for Fall Fest. It’s a beautiful scone. Made of scone dough.

Everything in the filling was so nice.

Making scones. A wonderful time.

They are nice.  Nice delicious scones. So they are nice, and delicious, and also good. A wonderful experience.

(I can also tell you the golden tops break at first bite, sending tender crumbs to your lap. They are savory, earthy and salty, with a scallion edge and mellow streaks of dill. They’ll share the plate with smoked salmon and eggs for breakfast and thick seafood soups at night. I nibbled a crusty, cheese-baked corner and thought they’re good, okay, maybe needs something, and twenty minutes later I’d eaten three. Scones, not bites.)

So. Now we know about showing and telling and it appears, at least where food blogging and community trip reports are concerned, that showing is best. Now, off with you to make these scones. I hear they’re quite nice.

SPANAKOPITA SCONES

Spanakopita Filling

1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
4 oz. spinach, washed, trimmed and chopped (about 2 cups chopped)
5 green onion stalks, chopped
4 large sprigs of fresh dill, chopped
8 oz. feta cheese, crumbled
1 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon ground white pepper

Scone Dough

4 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon sugar
2 oz. Parmesan cheese, grated (about 1/4 cup)
6 oz. cold butter, cubed (12 tablespoons)
4 large eggs
1 cup half and half (light cream)

extra half and half, for tops
extra sea salt, for sprinkling

———————

make spanakopita filling:

Heat olive oil in large skillet over medium heat. Add chopped green onions and saute, stirring, until onions are softened and slightly browned. Stir in spinach and saute with onions until spinach wilts, about 2 minutes. Remove from heat. Set a strainer over a bowl. Scrape spinach mixture into strainer, and press on spinach to drain as much liquid as possible.

When spinach mixture is drained and slightly cooled, place in medium bowl. Add chopped dill, feta cheese, sea salt and white pepper, and stir together until chunky, but thoroughly combined. Set filling aside.

mix scones:

Preheat the oven to 400° F.

Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, sea salt, sugar and grated Parmesan in large mixing bowl or stand mixer bowl.

Cut in butter. You can do this one of two ways:

Electric stand mixer With the flour mixture in the stand mixer bowl and the paddle blade attached, turn on the slowest speed and slowly add butter chunks, mixing to a coarse meal texture, with only a few remaining large flour-butter crumbs.

(or)

By hand Using a sharp-bladed pastry cutter tool, or two knives, “cut” the butter pieces into the flour mixture until you have a coarse meal texture.

In a separate bowl, whisk together eggs and half and half.

Add liquid mixture to dry ingredients by hand or with stand mixer on low, using “on-off” mixing. Stop just before mixture comes together. Add cooled Spanakopita Filling, then continue mixing briefly to form a soft and sticky dough. Scrape dough onto lightly floured surface and turn over a few times to combine, adding flour if necessary.

Form scones Pat dough 3/4 – 1″ thick and use tall cookie or biscuit cutters to form round or triangle shapes, large or small. As you cut and remove scones, gently push remaining dough together (do not knead or press dough again) to cut new scones. Alternatively, you may divide dough in half, form each half into a 3/4 – 1″ thick round, and cut equal wedges.

Transfer scones to parchment-lined sheet pans.

If desired, lightly brush tops of scones with half and half, then sprinkle each with a dash of sea salt. Bake 15-18 minutes, or until set and tops are golden brown. Cool briefly on baking sheet, then transfer to rack.

Approximately 12-16 large scones, 24-32 smaller scones. Serve warm or at room temperature. Scones are best served the same day.

For more on mixing and forming scones, see Scone, Scone on the Range.

Summer Fest is now Fall Fest, an ongoing celebration of good food and great ideas from food and garden bloggers around the globe. Every week we share great recipes, stories and tips for marvelous seasonal ingredients. You can participate by visiting the guest blogs to share links or comments – and if you’re particularly inspired, contribute a post of your own. Drop by A Way to Garden for details on how join the party.

Continue Reading »

Tags: fall fest, scones, show and tell, spanakopita, spinach

In 1975, the first recipe I tried from the Better Homes and Gardens Junior Cook Book (“For Beginning Cooks of All Ages”) was Creamy Lemon Pie, page 58. “You’ll be proud to serve this mouth-watering pie at a family dinner or a fancy party.” I was eight, and reread the words several times, to make sure they were talking to me: Serve. Family dinner. Fancy party. I followed the recipe to the letter, agonizing over the terms. “Beat egg with fork till no white shows.” Did I see any white? I think I saw white. More beating.  “The delicate graham-cracker crust.” How delicate was delicate? Delicate like bubbles, or delicate like that green candy dish I broke? And how did you pronounce that, anyway? I hoped no one would ask me to say it.

The tangy yellow pie was a triumph, especially the graham-crumb star on top, which they had pictured on page 58. You may want to make up your own design, the book said. Nothing doing. I copied it, certain their six-point star would unlock the door to mouth-watering. Fancy party. I cooked my way through the book step by 1-2-3 step, carefully turning out Tutti-Frutti-Ice Sparkle, Quick Walnut Penuche, Flip-Flop Pancakes and steaming, butter-pat perfect Baked Potatoes.

Baked potatoes had few ingredients – one – but apparently required a recipe. I followed it. Fifteen years and four kitchens passed before I stopped following recipes, before I started jotting yolk-stained notes, before trusting my own hands, before saying why yes, I will make up my own design. Enough experience and the deceptively easy – the omelet, the pie crust, the potato – will come easier. Directives loosen and slide and one day, in your kitchen, you throw in this and take out that, and the recipes serve as inspiration. Your hands trust you.

Still, even the seasoned cook takes steps forward and back. For Summer Fest Potato Week (soon to be Fall Fest),  I thought nothing like baked potatoes, and since no tricks or twists can make them better than they are, I decided to pull my BHG Junior Cook Book and retrace my steps, following the Baked Potatoes recipe exactly as I did in ’75, which is to say, exactly. I found the beloved blue squares basic and soothing, and also found they produced the finest baked potato a beginning cook – or any cook, of any age – can make.

Set oven at 425°. Scrub dirt off potatoes. Stick with a fork to make holes for the hot steam to escape.

Note that the wire brush is not the exact one pictured in the book. Had I the wrong brush in 1975, I might have assumed the potatoes would come out wrong – deflated or something. Guess what? Brush not important.

Put potatoes on oven rack. Bake potatoes 40 to 60 minutes. They will be soft when squeezed with toweling.

And indeed, they are soft when squeezed with paper toweling. I was so enamored with the word. Would you pass me a paper toweling? Mother, I think we are out of toweling.

Cut a cross in the top of each potato with a paring knife. Place a pat of butter or margarine in each opening.

That cross-cutting bit was clear to me but oh dear, butter or margarine. Which one? Also, the BHG illustration (see above, #3) taught me that when dealing with butter, a pat was not just a slice, but a square yellow thickness of your choice.

There we have it. I followed my own junior footsteps and turned out the same excellent, crisp-skin and fluff-center potatoes. I didn’t toy with perfection then and, experience aside, don’t see any reason to now.

Well. You know.

Continue Reading »

Tags: baked potatoes, BHG Junior Cook Book, crazy OCD kid, summer fest 2010

It’s Rosh Hashanah this week, the Jewish New Year. I like a holiday with food symbols and Rosh Hashanah delivers with apples and honey, for the sweetness of life. Yes, the holiday also features bittersweet looking back, and ruminating, planning and promising but mostly, it brings kugel.

So many cooks out there right now, today, standing in a kitchen riffling crumb-filled pages and spotted recipe cards, looking for that kugel. Grandma’s kugel, my mom’s neighbor’s kugel, that kugel we had at Lynn’s house, Aunt Rose’s kugel. Those bags of yellow egg noodles form a rock-solid tradition, so once a year – the old-school, annual way we used to watch The Sound of Music or The Ten Commandments – we’ll revisit Aunt Rose’s kugel. She was a lovely lady who smelled of atomizers and Aqua Net, always ready with a hug (and an index card). Wishing you good cooking, with an orchard of apples and a river of honey. Have a sweet year.

Noodle Kugel: Four Sisters, One Card

From October 18, 2008. Original post here.

Noodle kugel is a humble dish with an outsize name – a funny name, good for comedians and grandmas and giggling kids. Kugel is ripe with pronunciation – koo-gle or kuh-gle or whatever, just pass-me-that-stuff-now. It’s found on Jewish holiday tables and in deli case pyramids, golden twisty egg noodles cut in thick and improbably square slabs, bound by sour cream and more eggs, cottage cheese and drifting sugar. My family’s kugel is found on this 3 x 5 card.

Wearing butter stains and cinnamon age spots, the card appears each holiday in my mother’s kitchen – first under a fridge magnet (“I need to know where it is”) and eventually, on the counter. She could probably make kugel in her sleep, but it sits there, near the Pyrex, guiding the process like a curious lucky charm. Continue Reading »

Another late August, another juicy Summer Fest finale. For last year’s Tomato Week – which, I recall, also featured sweltering heat and flagging ambition – I cranked up the oven and rolled dough spirals and generally made things as hard as possible. Did I learn my lesson? You be the judge.

Better yet, let’s have my late grandmother be the judge. (Trust me, there was nothing she couldn’t judge.) Grandma Trudy enjoyed giving gifts – truly, she did. She chose my and my siblings’ birthday, holiday, graduation gifts with care. But the part she loved? I mean, lived for? That would be the actual giving of gifts, because immediately following the giving came the reciting of disclaimers.

If you don’t like it, it can go back. I like it. Don’t like the color? Gray is nice. I can get it in blue. Really, gray’s fine. If sweaters make you itch, it goes back. Sweaters are fine. So you know! Receipt is in the box.

I’m certain that if grandma were alive and food blogging, it would go something like this:

So, Cherry Tomato & Maytag Blue Beignets. What? Sounds fancy. Sounds like a lot of fat. If you don’t want fat, don’t eat it.

Tomatoes, I like tomatoes. Not too many tomatoes – heartburn. You don’t have heartburn? Good for you! Eat the tomatoes.


Who frys in summer? My doctor says no frying. And if you don’t like cooking don’t cook! Just order in. Wait – I’ve got menus in the drawer.


So, they’re pretty. But they remind me of – what are those things, in the bread, with the lettuce and funny sauce, on Dempster Street, in the round bread? I don’t know. They remind me of those.

I have to say, these were not bad, not bad, might even be okay – but vey schmeer, the work. Who needs work in the kitchen? Your grandpa, he makes French toast in the kitchen. He’s crazy. If you don’t like work, this recipe can go back.

——————

Makes 35-50, depending on tomato size. Serve warm or at room temperature as an appetizer, on a brunch buffet, or as a very fancy sports snack.

CHERRY TOMATO & MAYTAG BLUE BEIGNETS

2 1/4 teaspoons yeast
1/4 cup warm water

2 tablespoons vegetable shortening
1/3 cup water

4 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/8 teaspoon white pepper, ground
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 egg, lightly beaten

small wedge Maytag Blue Cheese, about 5 oz. (Stilton would also work well)
35-50 cherry tomatoes, small size, in season (I used locally-grown Sun Golds)

vegetable oil, for frying
sea salt, white pepper and cayenne pepper, for rolling
chives or other herbs for garnish, chopped fine
————–
Make beignet dough: Place yeast in large bowl (if using stand mixer, bottom of mixer bowl) and pour 1/4 cup warm water over yeast to dissolve. Set aside until yeast is bubbling and activated. Place 1/3 cup water and vegetable shortening in small microwave-safe bowl. Microwave on high for 20-25 seconds, until shortening begins to melt. Remove and stir until shortening is completely melted.

Sift flour with sugar, sea salt and white pepper. Add melted shortening, buttermilk, and beaten egg to activated yeast. Whisk (or use paddle attachment, on mixer) together to combine. Add 2 cups of the flour mixture (by hand with a wooden spoon, by mixer with paddle on low) until a wet, sticky mass forms. Gradually add remaining 2 cups of flour to form a shaggy but fully combined dough. NOTE: Humidity makes a difference. If dough looks wet and sticky, add more flour. If dough begins to look dry and resists mixing, stop adding flour.

Roll and form beignets: Turn dough out onto lightly floured surface. Turn over once or twice to smooth – but don’t knead it. Roll dough into a large rectangle, 1/8 – 1/4″ thick. Using pastry or pizza wheel, mark 1 1/2″ x 1 1/2″ squares. Place one cherry tomato and a generous dab of blue cheese in center of each square. Pinch up corners of each square to meet, pressing edges together to seal, then roll beignet between palms to create a seamless ball. Place on a foil or parchment-lined sheet pan, and continue rolling filled beignets until done. NOTE: beignets may be formed up to one day in advance. Cover loosely with foil and store in refrigerator until ready to fry.

Frying beignets: Line a sheet pan or large plate with paper towels. Sprinkle the paper towels with an even, fine layer of sea salt, then large dashes of cayenne and white pepper, to taste.

In large pot or deep fryer, heat vegetable oil (at least a few inches) to approximately 360°. I recommend using a fry/candy thermometer to monitor oil temperature – too low and beignets will be heavy and greasy; too high and you’ll get dark outsides, raw insides. When oil is hot (test a small piece of dough – if it puffs to the top, it’s ready) drop the beignets into the pot one by one, working in small batches.  Beignets should puff and brown quickly, about 1-2 minutes. If beignets do not rise and puff, slightly raise heat. If beignets burn too fast, slightly lower heat.

When beignets are evenly gold-brown, remove from oil and drain on “seasoned” paper towel-lined pan. When you have several warm beignets on pan, pick up edges of paper towels, allowing beignets to roll and coat with seasoning. Continue frying batches of beignets until done, rolling each batch in seasoning (add more salt/cayenne/white pepper if necessary).

Serving: serve warm or at room temperature, up to four hours after frying. May garnish with chopped chives or other herbs, as desired.

————–
Summer Fest is an annual online celebration of good food and great ideas, featuring food and garden bloggers from around the globe. Every week we highlight a different seasonal ingredient – corn, stone fruit, tomatoes – and our guest bloggers share great recipes, stories and tips. You can participate by visiting these terrific blogs and leaving links or comments – and if you’re feeling particularly inspired, you can contribute a post of your own. Drop by A Way to Garden for details on how join the party.

THIS WEEK’S LINKS: TOMATOES

Gluten-Free Girl and the Chef: Heirloom Tomato Tart with Parmesan Crust

Nicole at Pinch My Salt: What to do with slow-roasted tomatoes

Alison at Food2: Heirloom tomatoes

The FN Dish: Tyler’s Ultimate Tomato Salads

Margaret at A Way to Garden: More than one way to ripen a tomato

Gilded Fork: Celebrating summer lusciousness with a tomato dossier and recipes

Diane and Todd at White on Rice Couple: Sun-dried tomatoes (actually made in the sun!)

Paige at The Sister Project: 3 substantial, healthy, vegetarian tomatoey main dishes

Liz at the Cooking Channel: Easy Tomato Tart

Kelly at Just a Taste: Tomato Jam

Alexis at Food Network UK: The seven deadly tomato sins

Michelle at Healthy Eats: Top 10 Things to Do With Tomatoes

Alana at Eating From the Ground Up: Roasted Green Salsa (green zebras and tomatillos), and how late August makes her hurt for New Mexico

Caron at San Diego Foodstuff: Chunky Garden Gazpacho with Flowered Corn Tortillas and Melissa Clark’s Tomato Tarte Tatin

Judy at Over a Tuscan Stove: Tomatoes, the Italian Way

Caroline at the Wright Recipes: Savory Tomato Crumble

Tigress in a Pickle: Over 50 ways to preserve tomatoes in jars

Cate at Sweetnicks: Loaded Bowl of Deliciousness

Tags: beignets, disclaimers, maytag blue cheese, oh Grandma, summer fest, tomatoes

Have you seen the movie Waitress? It came out in 2007, but I never forget a movie in which pie takes a starring role.  Keri Russell plays Jenna, a small-town diner waitress with a problem – she’s pregnant. And unhappy. She doesn’t love the baby’s father – her husband Earl – but does love her obstetrician, with whom she’s having an affair. She’s also a gifted pie baker, and since the town’s citizens swear by their daily slices, at least she’s got her job.

We see Jenna make dozens of pies, from banana cream to blackberry chocolate, and she names each pie to match her mood, names like “I Can’t Have No Affair Because It’s Wrong And I Don’t Want Earl To Kill Me Pie (vanilla custard with banana, hold the banana)” and “Pregnant Miserable Self Pitying Loser Pie (lumpy oatmeal with fruitcake mashed in).” Waitress is funny, intelligent, delicious and, best of all, features an elderly Andy Griffith as Old Joe, a sly, pie-loving philosopher. See it and you won’t be sorry. Possibly hungry, but not sorry.

In other news, I baked a pie – made for the wonderful cross-blog food event Summer Fest. I’m contributing to this week’s topic, Stone Fruits, and next week’s topic, Tomatoes.  Summer Fest 2010 features more wonderful food bloggers than ever (I had a swell time last year, too), listed at the end of this post. Be sure to visit them all today to check out their marvelous recipes, tips and ideas – and share some of your own.

What did I call my pie? Well, I wasn’t sure, at least not until late afternoon. Despite the presence of good pie, one never does know where the day will lead. Let’s take a look.

“Dopey Marilyn Doesn’t Have a Pitter, So Pal Melanie Helped Her Pit Cherries With A Knife Pie,” also known as “Melanie Was Real Mad At Her Landlord And Took It Out On The Bloody Cherries Pie.”

“Calls From Auto Insurance, Volleyball Coach, Dentist, Piano Teacher and Mom Tryin’ To Keep Me From Rolling Dough Pie.”

“Why Does Melanie Back Away Slow When I Start Cutting Dough Leaves? Pie”

“The Dog’s Breath Smells Like Ginger ‘Cause Half The Crunch Hit The Floor Pie”

and finally,

“Hungry Crabby Tired Back-To-School Josie Got A Fork And That Was All She Wrote Pie.”

CHERRY APRICOT PIE with GINGER-ALMOND CRUNCH

1. Make pie dough. Roll crust into pie plate as directed, and chill in refrigerator until ready to fill.

2. Make Ginger-Almond Crunch. Refrigerate until ready to use.

3. Make Cherry Apricot filling. Pour filling into prepared pie crust. Finish and bake as directed, using one of the options below.

If you’ve prepared a fluted pie crust: sprinkle Ginger-Almond Crunch evenly over pie filling, covering fruit. Place pie on a foil-lined baking sheet (wide enough to catch all drips) and set in lower third of preheated 400° oven. Bake approximately 30 minutes, then lower oven temperature to 350° and bake an additional 30 minutes, or until crust is golden brown and juices are thickened and bubbling. If crust and crunch topping brown too quickly, tent pie loosely with foil and bake until done. Cool completely before slicing. Delicious warm, but expect broken, cobbler-like pieces. Which are also good.

If you’ve prepared for a leaf cutout crust: Remove leaf cutouts from refrigerator. Fill a small bowl with water. Using fingers, moisten the back of one leaf cutout and press it gently but firmly to pie dough rim, adhering to folded edge. Add remaining leaves in an overlapping pattern, moistening and pressing each one to form a natural “wreath” along the rim.

When leaf edge is complete, sprinkle Ginger-Almond Crunch evenly over pie filling, covering fruit. Place pie on a foil-lined baking sheet (wide enough to catch all drips) and set in lower third of preheated 400° oven. Bake approximately 30 minutes, then lower oven temperature to 350° and bake an additional 30 minutes, or until crust is golden brown and juices are thickened and bubbling. If crust and crunch topping brown too quickly, tent pie loosely with foil and bake until done. Cool completely before slicing. Delicious warm, but expect broken, cobbler-like pieces. Which are also good.

——-

Pie Crust

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
12 tablespoons unsalted butter, cold
3 tablespoons chilled vegetable shortening
1/4 cup ice water

Food processor method: Place flour and salt in processor bowl. Cut butter and shortening in pieces, and sprinkle over flour mixture. Pulse machine on/off to cut butter/shortening into flour, forming coarse crumbs and a few remaining chunks. Trickle ice water over mixture, pulsing until it just comes together as a rough, unformed dough, about 20-30 seconds. Wrap and chill, at least 1 hour.

On a lightly floured work surface, divide pie dough in half, patting each half into a flattened round. (Reserve one half to roll decorative leaf or other cutouts, if desired, or wrap and chill for another use.) Roll first half of dough into a round approximately 1/8″ thick, turning as you roll to prevent sticking. Round size should be slightly larger than your 9″ or 10″ deep-dish pie plate. Transfer round to pie plate, lightly pressing dough to fit, and patching small cracks or tears if necessary. Trim excess dough, leaving about 1″ of overhang.

For fluted rim pie crust: Gently fold overhang up and over pie plate rim, pressing dough with thumb and forefinger as you work around whole plate to form a decorative indented rim. Chill unbaked crust in refrigerator until ready to fill.

For leaf cutout pie crust: Trim overhang to 1/2″, then fold up and over pie plate, pressing into a flat rim all around. Roll second half of dough to 1/8″ thick. Cut leaf shapes 1) with a leaf-shaped cookie cutter or 2) cutting freehand with a paring knife. Cut slightly pointed ovals (irregular is fine!) then use tip of paring knife to lightly score “leaf veining” marks on each one. Leaves will be added to edge after pie is filled, so chill cutouts in refrigerator until ready to use.

Ginger-Almond Crunch

5 tablespoons unsalted butter, cold
1/2 all-purpose flour
1/3 cup light brown sugar, packed
1/4 cup whole almonds, toasted
1/4 cup crystallized ginger chunks

Toast almonds in a skillet over medium heat, shaking until golden brown, about 5-6 minutes, OR toast in 350° oven on an ungreased baking sheet, about 10 minutes. Cool almonds completely before using.

Place toasted almonds and crystallized ginger in food processor bowl. Pulse machine on/off until you get small, coarse pieces. Add butter, flour, and brown sugar to bowl. Using on/off pulse again, process together into even, large crumbs. Transfer mixture to a small bowl, and refrigerate until ready to use.

Cherry Apricot Filling

1 1/2 pounds firm ripe apricots, pitted and quartered, about 4 cups
1 1/2 pound cherries, pitted
1 teaspoon lemon juice
3/4 cup sugar
3 1/2 tablespoons cornstarch
1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon pure almond extract

In large bowl, gently toss cut apricots and pitted cherries together with lemon juice. In small bowl, combine sugar and cornstarch. Sprinkle mixture over apricots and cherries, turning to coat, then add vanilla and almond extracts, lightly tossing until just mixed. Follow directions above for filling and baking pie.

Summer Fest is an annual online celebration of good food and great ideas, featuring food and garden bloggers from around the globe. Every week we highlight a different seasonal ingredient – corn, stone fruit, tomatoes – and our guest bloggers share wonderful recipes, stories and tips. You can participate by visiting these terrific blogs and leaving links or comments – and if you’re feeling particularly inspired, you can contribute a post of your own. Drop by A Way to Garden for details on how join the party.

THIS WEEK’S LINKS: STONE FRUIT

Sara at Cooking Channel: Savory Stone Fruit recipes.

Todd and Diane of White on Rice Couple: Riesling Poached Pluots.

Margaret at A Way to Garden: What is stone fruit, anyhow? Plus: Clafoutis batter revisited.

Caroline at The Wright Recipes: Ginger and Vanilla Poached Peaches.

The FN Dish: Paula’s Perfect Peach Cobbler.

Alison at Food2: Peachy Party Foods.

Kelly at Just a Taste: Peaches & Cream Cupcakes.

Liz on Healthy Eats: Puttin’ Up Peach Pickles, Compote and More.

Food Network UK: How to Poach a Peach.

Judy of Divina Cucina: Chocolate Amaretti Baked Apricots.

The Gilded Fork: dossier & recipes featuring peaches, apricots, nectarines, plums, cherries, almonds, coconuts.

Cate at Sweetnicks: Blueberry Peach Smoothies.

Tara at Tea & Cookies: Making Peach Jam.

Alana at Eating From the Ground Up: Stone fruit slump.

Caron of San Diego Foodstuff: grilled peach parfait and coconut peach gazpacho.

Gluten-Free Girl and the Chef: gluten-free peach-blueberry buckle.

Paige at The Sister Project: A Summer Fruit Whatchamacallit (not a pie, not a crisp, but delicious).

Marilyn at Simmer Till Done: Cherry Apricot Pie with Ginger-Almond Crunch.

Tigress in a Jam: nectarine preserve with summer savory and white pepper.

Tags: all movies should star pie, apricots, cherries, ginger, pie, summer fest, Waitress