Growing Peaches in Elkhart County: the Challenges and Rewards

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cobbler, Cooking, Country, dessert, Dinner, Eat, farm life, Food, Fruit, Fruit Tree, Garden, Gardening, healthy, Insect, Japanese Beetles, Kitchen, Life, Memories, Nature, Organic, Peaches, Pests, Recipe, rural, Self-Sufficient

This was our best year ever for peaches.

Peaches! I am so excited!

Bad frosts and windstorms have taken our peaches before they reached marble size in previous years. But, this year our peaches are turning golden, pink and red. I’m dreaming of peach jams, cobblers, pies and crisps.

All summer I’ve been checking the fruit daily, feeling the peaches to see if they’ve softened. As the summer days lengthened, our tree, heavily laden with fruit, has become as gorgeous and fragrant as any flower.

I swear, I can smell the peaches ripening. Evidently so can Japanese Beetles.

Yesterday disaster struck.

Japanese beetles devouring a ‘ripe’ peach.

Some peaches were ripe.

BUT, every “ripe” peach was swarming with and being devoured by Japanese beetles. Only the ripe peaches, mind you. The hard peaches, they left alone

My husband and I grabbed ladders and sacks and began picking. We picked every peach we could. After soaking them to get rid of any insects I set them out on my counter as recommended HERE.

Some food experts recommend putting peaches into a paper bag to ripen. Others swear that the only way to have good ripe peaches is to only pick them at the moment of peak ripeness.

How to tell if peaches are ripe:

• Attached to the tree: Peaches are best picked when the fruit separates easily from the twigs. If it is hard to pull off the tree, it isn’t ripe!
• Color: Green is definitely unripe, but you can’t use red color as an indicator of how ripe a peach is. Different peach varieties have differing amounts of red blush in their natural coloring. Pick them when the ground color changes from green to yellow, orange, red (or a combination). The skin of yellow-fleshed varieties ripens to an orange tint, while the skin of white-fleshed varieties changes from greenish- to yellow-white.
• Softness: Unless you like your peaches very firm, pick your peaches with just a little “give” when gently pressed. Peaches at this stage are great for eating, freezing, and baking. Peaches won’t ripen very much after picking!
• Odor: The peaches should smell sweet and ripe

Old Fashioned Southern Peach Cobbler

After a couple of days covered on the counter, the peaches, saved from the beetles, are ripe and ready. I have enough to make a peach cobbler and a peach pie, plus some for the freezer.

I love pies and crisps, BUT nothing pairs up so well freshly ripened organic peaches as a homemade cobbler crust. This dessert is one of my favorites. Especially topped with vanilla ice cream.

   Getting ready to make peach cobbler.

SOUTHERN PEACH COBBLER FOR TWO

(Can be doubled)

FILLING:

2 cups peaches

1/2 tsp. lemon juice

2 tablespoons brown sugar

1 tsp. cornstarch

TOPPING:

1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons flour

2 tsp. sugar

1/4 tsp. baking powder

Pinch of salt

Pinch of cinnamon

Pinch of nutmeg

1 tablespoon butter cut into pieces

2 tablespoons whipping cream

                 DIRECTIONS:

Grease small casserole dish with butter. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Peel & cut up peaches. Mix peaches and lemon juice. Mix cornstarch, brown sugar and cinnamon with peaches and put peaches into greased casserole dish.

In another bowl, mix flour, sugar, baking powder, salt. cinnamon and nutmeg. Cut in butter until mixture is crumbly. Add the cream and toss with flour mixture just until the dough is combined.

Turn the dough out onto a flour surface and knead a few times to smooth it. Then roll it out into the shape of the casserole dish. Place the dough over the filling and sprinkle with 1/4 tsp. of sugar. Bake until the top is golden and the juices are bubbling. 25 to 30 minutes.

Warm cobbler…what a great reward for all the previous hard work.

What we can learn from our Amish neighbors about staying healthy.

You don’t have to give up rich homemade desserts, like peach pie or peach cobbler to stay slim and healthy. Studies have shown that although the Amish eat a diet that includes plenty of sugar and is fairly high in fat – including saturated fat – from sources such as meat and eggs, their obesity rate is low. As a group they are healthier than most Americans. I’m sure this can be attributed to the Amish people raising their own food and performing physical labor throughout much of their day. ….Growing your own, also, gets you out in the fresh air, with free vitamin D from the sunlight at no extra charge.

Best of all…home-grown fruit is yummy!

County Fair Dinner Rolls…and a Bad Dog

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4-H Fair, Bread, Dinner, Dinner Rolls, Dog, Eating, Food, Food toxic to dogs, Kitchen, Recipe, Yeast Bread, Yeast Roll

Dinner rolls minus one roll.

I love County fairs. I was a 4-H member from grade school until my first year in college and my whole year revolved around projects that culminated during fair week. Rides, fair food, grandstand shows, the Women’s club exhibits, the 4-H exhibits and the animals — I love the smells, the game barkers, the music coming from the rides and especially watching people.

One year was more special than most. With lots of coaching from my mom, I made my mother and grandmother’s traditional holiday rolls and entered them in the County 4-H Fair. They won ”Best in Show” in the yeast bread category. Unfortunately, I had to freeze the rolls before the State fair, and because I used real butter and no preservatives, they went rancid.  I didn’t fare very well at the state fair. But, I’ll always have the memories of the time in the kitchen with my mom. It must have meant something to her too. She still has my Best of Show ribbon from the County Fair up in her attic.

Anyway, after smelling all the yeasty fritters and fried dough at the fair, I became inspired. Last night I dug out my tattered original handwritten recipe. I scalded. I mixed and I kneaded. I left the dough in a covered bowl overnight. This morning I shaped and set the almost finished rolls out in the warmest part of the kitchen to rise.

Buster, my border collie mix, watched.

When I came back into the kitchen later to check on my rolls, the towel that had been covering  the rolls was on the floor. A roll was missing. Buster was innocently sleeping on the rug in front of the stove.

He didn’t so much as blink when he saw me checking the rolls to see if any of those remaining were “obviously” licked or sniffed.

“Roll? What roll?”

Here’s my recipe…

“Best in Show” Dinner Rolls

• Warm 1/4 lb. butter, 1/2 cup sugar, 1 cup milk until lukewarm (scald milk, turn heat off, let butter melt then add sugar)

Scalded Milk is milk that has come to a boil. There will be a skin on the top of scalded milk.

• Mix yeast in lukewarm 1/2 cup of water.
• Beat 3 eggs.
• Mix milk and eggs and add yeast.
• Gradually add 5 cups flour and 1 tsp. salt.
• Let rise overnight in a covered bowl.

The dough is ready to be rolled or shaped and set out to rise again.

• In the morning knead a little. Shape your rolls. Let rise until evening.
• Bake at 350-375 until golden brown.

These are foolproof and delicious. The smell of yeast rising always reminds me of holiday times when I was a child. I’m trying to create the same kind of memories for my grandchildren. I hope you enjoy the rolls.

NOTE: If Buster had managed to snatch more rolls, it could have been fatal. According to this article, a dog’s stomach is a nice warm, moist environment, so, unbaked dough can expand to many times its size when ingested. Next time you make bread, rolls, doughnuts or anything with yeast, keep in mind any four-legged family members, who might be watching for a good “opportunity”. Please don’t leave “people” food out the way I did.