Tuesdays With Dorie…Mixed Berry Cobbler
Let’s just say that after reading the TWD comments on the P&Q section of the blog, I was This Close to not making the cobbler. This Close. I thought about making the Snickery Squares, since I missed that one. But as you can see, I didn’t want to give in that easily…and here we have a Mixed Berry Cobbler.
Typically I don’t read the P&Q section. I just don’t. But I am not a big fan of cobbler in the first place, so I wanted to see why so many TWDers were posting comments. Geez, am I glad I did. The advice was very helpful, and while it ends up altering Dorie’s original recipe, it isn’t too much of a deviation.
I made a half recipe, and used four small ramekins. To Dorie’s very basic “biscuit” as she calls it, I used the full amount of sugar, as well as some extra demarara sugar and even a bit of brown sugar, too. Everyone was saying it wan’t sweet enough, so I wanted to make sure mine didn’t meet that same fate. I also added about a teaspoon of grated orange peel, a pinch of cardamom, and some cinnamon in with the dry ingredients, and some vanilla with the wet. What I ended up with was a very tasty dough.
This morning I loaded Seven up before 9 and the two of us joined my Mom for an excursion to the Bob Pond Blueberry Farm, where we picked Black Raspberries and Blueberries for an hour or so. I wish I couuld say Sev was cooperative, but, ahh, not so much. Towards the end, I had to carry him on my hip as I picked. He was at least quiet that way, but as I was picking and not paying attention, I kept hearing him say “yum yum.” That’s when I noticed a little blue face and a mouthful of berries that he was picking literally behind my back. He’s nine months old, people, and already misbehaving. But so cute. I wish I had a picture.
So, Black Raspberries and Blueberries picked this morning made it into my Mixed Berry Cobbler. I grated the lemon zest and added sugar, just like Dorie said. Into the oven they went.
Straight out of the oven, they looked so cute, all nice and toasty and small. I had to cut into one to see what the negativity was about. Honestly, I can see. Without the flavor additions, this would have been fairly boring. But mine was good, and the orange really added a nice flavor, I think. It may have saved it for me. What really did the trick was the ice cream. Dorie knew what she was talking about, there. because we weren’t making her Vanilla Ice Cream recipe this week, I didn’t feel the need to make her recipe, so instead, I used a recipe from Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream Cookbook. While good, it was just plain ol’ vanilla ice cream, even though I added homemade vanilla sugar and used a vanilla bean instead of extract. But it was oh so easy, and I will definitely use it again…I will just increase the vanilla quite a bit.
So there it is folks…Mixed Berry Cobbler and Homemade Vanilla Ice Cream. Now, scoot on over to all of the other TWD blogs and see what they had to say!
