Kaoru: Summer Cobbler/Crisp

Mr Martini (to whom I am now engaged!) and I went to the farmer's market in search of fruit for the cobbler. We sampled our way through slices of necatarines and juicy pieces of strawberries and blueberries. It was all delicious, but it wasn't until I had tasted the peaches and plums that I was inspired. Both were incredibly sweet, slightly tart, and I knew they would be just perfect.





Fruit: I dropped the fruit in boiling water to ease the peeling process and ended up with four gorgeous peaches, and 2 plums. I then sliced them in large chunks directly in to my buttered dish. When I realized I needed a bit more fruit, I "filled" the rest of the dish with sliced apples. That's the beauty of cobbler - you can use whatever fruit you want and it almost always turns out just fine.

Topping: The topping was a simple mixture of equal parts sugar, flour and panko bread crumbs. I know most people like to use oatmeal, but I just don't have it on hand, and find that panko (which I always do have in my cupboard) does the trick. I rubbed in chilled cubes of butter (~3/4 stick) with my fingers until the the mixture was crumbly and generously poured it on top of the fruit. 60 minutes later at 350* ... voila!

Cobbler: The picture above is the first piece we extracted from the dish. Piping hot, Mr. Martini and I sampled the creation, which was heavenly -- the fruit flavors were intense, the fruit to crumble ratio was just right, and the apple added interesting texture to the fruit. The real success was starting with great ingredients from the farmer's market. I think I'm going to go eat another piece right now.