Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Cobbled together



I'm often looking for ways to get more fruits and vegetables into our diet.  Like tonight, when I added broccoli to my girls' "shell noodles" (Annie's mac & cheese).  I didn't know that Gillian could identify "bwoccolies," much less say the word pretty much correctly.  When we had Dorie's Mixed Berry Cobbler a few weeks ago, I was a bit surprised by how well it went over with everyone.  We made it a couple times, with a variety of berries, and had no trouble eating enough fruit that week.  =)

So I was happy to see that this week's recipe was for Cherry Rhubarb Cobbler.  However, I knew right away that I'd be making some changes, since I don't like cherries.  And while I'd like to try rhubarb, I haven't seen it around here lately.  So when I went shopping this week, I was on the lookout for other tart, red fruits to substitute.  A lot of fruit has been kind of expensive this season--the very dry spring and early summer haven't been good for the local stuff.  But I managed to find some nice-looking pluots on sale.  The raspberries also looked pretty good, so a pint of them jumped into the cart, too.  And I remembered to pick up some whole wheat flour for the topping (what I had in the pantry was rather old).


I left the skins on the pluots, since it's a pain to peel them.  Plus, the tartness of the skin balances out the sweetness of the flesh, and it gave the cooked filling a lovely red color.  I reduced the sugar just a bit, to 1/4 cup, since I didn't think my fruit was quite as tart as rhubarb would be, but left the amount of ginger at 1 teaspooon.  I didn't make any changes to the topping.


The verdict?  I really like the whole wheat in the topping, especially in combination with the brown sugar.  I definitely want to make it again.  I don't know if it was my changes to the fruit, but I should have cut back on the amount of ginger in the filling.  I liked it with the other flavors; it was just too much for my taste.  However, there was a simple solution in my freezer - some homemade vanilla ice cream tamed the spice of the ginger nicely.  And as usual, I ate my cobbler for breakfast.  The whole wheat offsets the ice cream, right?  =)

This week's selection comes from Amanda of Like Sprinkles on a Cupcake.  Head over to her blog for the recipe, or get yourself a copy of Baking From My Home to Yours!  And don't forget to check out the blogroll at Tuesdays with Dorie for lots of other wonderful cobblers.  


28 comments:

  1. your fruits sound tasty :) i liked the whole wheat too!

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  2. Whole wheat definitely offsets ice cream. Oh yeah, and ice cream is just you getting your dairy in for the morning. I swear, I can justify anything for breakfast :) Your cobbler looks delicious!

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  3. Your cobbler looks great! I like the mixed fruit selection.

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  4. Great flavors and fruit choices! It looks wonderful!

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  5. I've never heard of pluots...sounds interesting! Your cobbler looks delicous!

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  6. I had some for breakfast, too! I'm thinking that a bit of grated lemon zest might be better with this flavor combo rather than the ginger.

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  7. It looks fabulous!

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  8. It looks wonderful and I love the photos!

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  9. Mmmm! I love the idea of the pluots! And your fruits look gorgeous!

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  10. Looks great, I'm a leave the skin on kind of gal too.

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  11. pluots?? cool choice! looks really pretty, too. btw, the ginger, no matter which fruit, seemed heavy to me too, so I knocked it down a bit the second time i made it...

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  12. Looks great! I liked the way the whole wheat worked in the topping, too. Good job on getting in all of those fruits.

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  13. Ice cream is a dairy product. Lots of calcium. *Perfect* for breakfast.

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  14. Your cobbler looks delicious! I like the fruits that you used. Great job!

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  15. Gorgeous photos as usual. I love the fruit combo and I'm so glad that bit of wheat helped with my ice cream guilt:)

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  16. What a tasty use for cobbler, ice cream topping. Nice!

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  17. The whole wheat is awesome! I'm surprised people are having an aversion to it. Guess I've been hooked on whole-wheat products for long enough to get used to it. Never had pluots before, but it's something interesting I'll have to try.

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  18. Your pictures are fabulous! Love your choice of fruit, too.

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  19. love your topping...i loved this whole wheat brown sugar combo. funny my ginger was not even really noticeable.

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  20. Thanks so much for visiting my blog, your cobbler looks wonderful!

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  21. Yum, your cobbler looks great :) I found the ginger a little overpowering as well.

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  22. Cobbler for breakfast sounds like a breakfast of champions to me!

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  23. Mmmm... raspberries! Great job!
    Clara @ iheartfood4thought

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  24. I love your fruit combination. The filling does have a lovely color. And yes, I would have that for breakfast anytime! :)

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  25. Thank you for the welcome to TWD. I think it is awesome that you substituted completely different fruit and that the flavor combination worked out for you. I have never used a pluot, but i think i saw them at the store the other day and thought, "what is that". I think now I have to go buy one to try it and to see what you were working with. Oh, i agree with you on Penzey's. When i went in I wanted to buy everything in the store. I was really controlling myself just getting those 3 things :).

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  26. looks great, i would love to try it with pluots :)

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  27. I have never seen a pluot before. Very cool. I guess they don't have them in Canada. Thanks for educating me! Your cobbler looks yummy.

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  28. I like the fruits you chose and I also liked the topping a lot!

    I look forward to your post next week..cute photo on your other post!

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