Peach and Blueberry Buckle

We are coming to those last precious days of summer. August is winding down and fall is right around the corner. As a kid, I always loved this time of year. As we have previously discussed, I’m a bit of a nerd. By the last week of August I was ready to go back to school. I loved getting my school supply shopping list in the mail. I would beg and plead my mom to go to the store and pick everything up right now!

We would go to Vix (in the days before Target in western New York) and I would look thru the aisles at all the new school supplies. Even though I already had two sets of colored pencils, they simply would not do. It was a new year, I needed new pencils! Same goes for folders and pens, binders and erasers. A new year meant a new beginning.

I was always a fairly simple shopper though. I was never one to get bright cartooned folders or Trapper Keepers (c’mon, you remember). I wanted plain colored binders and a matching folder to go along with it. I had that kind of OCD. The organizational OCD. I would write my name on all my new supplies and lay them out, ready for school to start.

In these last few days of August, there is something else to revel in. Stone fruits are at their best right now. I’m talking peaches, nectarines, plums. Those fruits that, when eaten by hand, make an enormous mess of everything in a five foot radius. I find myself in the grocery store or at the farmers market, fondling and smelling the peaches. Keep your peaches away from me, I just might accost them.

When I find some good ones I have a hard time deciding what to do with them. Do I eat them fresh? Do I slice them up and put them over breakfast? How about simmered on the stovetop with cinnamon and nutmeg and eaten warm with ice cream? No, today we make a buckle. There are so many different types of fruit cobbles that I have a slim understanding of how they differ from each other. I think it easiest to define each, as I make them. So for today…

Fruit Buckle – A single layer of cake, generally with berries added to the batter, topped with streusel. Also known as a crumble.

Now that you know what you are baking, head out to the store (or the farmers market) and get yourself some peaches. And some blueberries. There, now we’re ready to bake.

Peach and Blueberry Buckle

Adapted from - The King Arthur Flour Baker’s Companion

Batter

¾ cup sugar

4 tbsp butter

1 large egg

½ cup milk

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 tsp baking powder

½ tsp salt

¼ tsp nutmeg

1 cup blueberries

2 peaches (skinned and sliced)



Streusel

¾ cup sugar

¾ cup flour

1 tsp cinnamon

2 tsp lemon zest

½ tsp salt

5 tbsp butter, softened



For the batter:

1. Cream together the butter and sugar. Add egg and mix for a minute.

2. Combine dry ingredients

3. Add dry ingredients to the creamed mixture, alternating with the milk. Begin and end with dry ingredients

For the Streusel:

1. Whisk together dry ingredients

2. Cut in butter with a pastry cutter (or two forks) until crumbly

Put it together:

1. Grease and flour an 8x8 glass baking dish, preheat oven to 375

2. Spread half of the batter into the bottom of the baking dish

3. Layer the sliced peaches on top the batter

4. Mix blueberries into the remaining batter and spoon on top of peaches

5. Sprinkle streusel topping evenly over buckle

6. Bake in a 375 degree oven for 45 minutes

7. Allow to cool on a cooling rack

Enjoy with some ice cream for dessert, or in the middle of the day for a snack!