When we lived in ND we could always count on this guy from Mott, ND, just south of us, to bring fresh Washington and Montana fruit to town. He picked the fruit himself, and the peaches in particular were always wonderful.
I have yet to see Washington peaches in the stores here, only California peaches which I never like very much. They never seem very juicy. Ditto for Georgia peaches.
Boommate is a connoisseur of Colorado peaches. They are now just starting to show up in stores and fruit trucks. She is so fussy, though, that she will only eat Colorado peaches from the Palisades area of the state, preferably grown by Talbott farms. A fruit truck came to town last week selling Colorado peaches but she couldn’t tell what part of Colorado they came from. We were lucky to find some in Sioux Falls yesterday and now they are ripening in paper bags. Boommate insists that I must make at least one crumble with them.
I have made a couple of crumbles this summer, one with nectarines and one with peaches. I have some more nectarines almost ripe enough to bake, and I plan to make them into a crumble with some sweet cherries. My crumbles are pretty simple. I just put about 6 cups of sliced fruit into a buttered 9 × 12 baking dish, mix up 2 c of white flour, 2 c of firmly packed light brown sugar, 1/2 t cinnamon, 1/4 t nutmeg, and a cup of butter in the food processor until it is crumbly, sprinkle it on top of the fruit, and bake at 375° for 30-40 minutes until it is nicely browned and the fruit is bubbling thickly.
Crumbles are my go to desserts in the summer. I don’t have the patience to can peaches or make jam from them. We bought two more bags of brown sugar yesterday so we are well provisioned for a few more crumbles this month.
What foods are you the most fussy about? Where do you like to buy your seasonal produce? Do you care where your peaches are from?
