Baked and bubbling Fast Fruit Cobbler

Summertime is fruit time! While I love eating fresh fruit and serving it as close to its natural state as possible, it’s also fun to use fruit in baking. My hubbie is a cobbler fanatic so whenever I have stone fruit and/or berries that have seen slightly better days, I bake up a cobbler! 

I’ve made this recipe many times and it always comes out perfectly. As with just about every recipe I provide, feel free to tinker to your liking. For example, alter the amount of sugar (very sweet fruit calls for a slight decrease in the amount). Also, try out different stone fruits such as cherries, apricots and nectarines or blueberries.

Spread the cobbler love throughout the year by freezing fruit. Berries, stone fruit and diced rhubarb freeze beautifully as long as you freeze them on a baking sheet (lined with parchment paper) so that none of the bits are touching. Then promptly put them in a plaster zipper bag and back into the freezer.

Fast Fruit Cobbler

Ingredients:
4 TBS melted unsalted butter
3/4 cup flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 TBS sugar mixed with 1 tsp. almond extract (this addition makes ALL the difference)
1 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
3/4 cup milk
2-3 cups diced fruit (stone fruit and/or berries)

Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees with the rack in the middle position.
2. Pour the butter and milk into a medium-size bowl.
2. Add  the dry ingredients together (excluding the almond sugar).
3. Whisk until all the lumps are gone.
4. Pour the batter into a square or circular pan that is about 8 inches across.
5. Sprinkle the fruit onto the batter, distributing it evenly. Don’t push it down – let it lie.
6. Drizzle the almond sugar mixture over the fruit – it will be like a thick syrup.
7. Bake for 50 minutes total, turning the pan around half way through to ensure even baking. Okay so maybe 50 minutes isn’t so fast but it’s very fast to assemble. 
8. Allow pan to cool, sitting on a raised rack for about 20 minutes. The cobbler will taste better as it cools and is really awesome the next day. Serve with a little whipped cream or ice cream.

This is about to be an amazing cobbler, just as soon as it bakes.