mulberryshoots

I’ve been wanting to make a peach pie all summer but I haven’t found any fruit that was ripe enough to use. Even the local peaches at the farm stand were rock hard. So today at the grocery store, I found some white peaches that were fragrant and felt ripe but not too ripe. I bought six of them and put them in a simmering pot of water for about 3-4 minutes. I took them out and under cold running water, their skins peeled off readily and as easily as any I’ve ever prepared.

The peeled peaches lend an extra challenge when using because the center of the peach has a crusty rough part that sticks to the peach segments when you cut them up. I cut them off the first peach but then cut slices around the core to avoid the tough red stuff on the others. To the sliced peaches, I mixed together about a third of a cup of flour, a third of a cup of sugar, two tablespoons of cinnamon and a tablespoon of ground nutmeg. I stirred it together until finely mixed and added it to the peaches, stirring gently until all the fruit was covered.

Instead of making a pie crust, I had taken out a piece of puff pastry from the freezer when I had begun to prepare the peaches. After it thawed, I spread a little flour on a board and laid it out, rolling it gently with a rolling pin until it was as thin as it could be and still hold together to be a crust.

I then spooned the peach mixture onto the puff pastry sheet and drew up both sides, leaving the top open and closing the sides by pinching the dough together. The trickiest part was lifting the pie in one piece onto parchment paper in a baking pan (next time, I’ll put the pastry on the parchment paper and fill it there!)  Into a 400 degree oven, I set the timer for about 45 minutes.

We’ll give a portion to George’s brother and Mom who live across the street, and serve ours warmed up with a little vanilla ice cream I have in the freezer tonight. A luscious dessert to enjoy after a rather spartan dinner. Yum!