Peach Cobbler with Sweet Cream Crust

Ingredients

1 stick (4 oz.) butter, chopped

3/4 c. heavy cream
6 c. fresh peaches (buy 2 3/4 pounds)
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ginger
1/2 c. sugar
3 tablespoons corn starch
1 1/2 c. flour
2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt

Directions

1. Place butter and cream in freezer. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

3. Peel peaches. Slice 1/4″ thick.

4. Toss peaches with sugar, cinnamon, ginger and corn starch. Place in 8″ baking dish.

4. In food processor bowl combine flour, baking powder and salt. Pulse to combine. Add butter with a spoon in three batches, pulsing between additions until mixture looks like coarse meal.

5. Transfer flour mixture to a medium bowl. Slowly add heavy cream, folding gently until just mixed.

6. Gently pat dough into 1/2″ thick pieces and place on top of peaches. Handle the dough as little as possible.

7. Bake 45-50 minutes or until golden brown and bubbly. Let sit 15 minutes. Serve with vanilla ice cream, of course.

Robin is the Food and Drink Editor for Girls Guide. You can check out her personal blog, Poppymom.com, where she talks about awesome shows she attends and raising a family with sass. You can contact Robin by Emailing her – robin [at] girlsguidetothegalaxy [dot] com, and you can follow her on Twitter – @poppymom.

I have no idea why this gadget got my attention, since I don’t even like White Castles.

A few weeks before Mr. Mays’ untimely and overshadowed passing, I found an interesting take on sliders that doesn’t involve a special contraption. Between Billy’s death and a holiday weekend forecast that isn’t exactly grill-friendly, it seems like a good time to localize these oven-based sliders and add a crunchy take on a farmer’s market staple: Bacon-Blue Sliders with Beer-Battered Squash.

Bacon-Blue Sliders

• 1 cup sweet onion, small diced (abundant at the farmer’s markets)
• 1 1/2 pounds American Grassfed ground beef
• 1 pound Burger’s peppered bacon (reserve 2 slices)
• Ropp Jersey Chedder Blue cheese, crumbled
• 8 Companion Bakery chipotle slider buns.

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. Spread onions on the bottom of a 9″ x 13″ baking dish. Evenly spread ground beef to all edges of the dish. Overlapping, cover with slices of bacon. Bake 35 minutes. It’ll be swimming in grease. Don’t fear. Using a metal ladle and heatproof container (Pyrex glass or an old can), scoop the grease from around the edges.
3. Evenly top with cheese. Return to oven for two minutes or until cheese is melty.
4. Cut meat into eight equal burgers and place on buns.

Beer-Battered Squash

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 6 ounces Schalfly Summer Lager (or other lager-style beer)
• 2 egg whites, whipped until really frothy
• 2 slices bacon
• canola oil
• 4 small to medium yellow squash and/or zucchini, sliced 1/4″ thick  (If you can’t find them, you’re not looking.)

1. In a medium bowl, combine flour, salt, and beer. Gently, fold in whipped egg whites.
2. In a large skillet, cook two slices of bacon. When finished, remove from pan, leaving the drippings. Add enough canola oil to the skillet to equal about 1/4″. Heat until oil sizzles when a drop of water is added.
3. While waiting for oil to heat, eat the bacon and drink the remaining six ounces of beer. It’s hot. You’ve earned it. 
4. Working in small batches, dunk squash slices into the batter and coat completely. Add to the hot oil, being careful to not overcrowd.
5. Cook about two minutes, flip, and continue cooking until golden brown. Place cooked squash rounds on a brown paper shopping bag to drain.

This isn’t health food by any means. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if this was the meal that kicked Mr. Mays’ heart disease into overdrive last week. Regardless, it’s a holiday and this is an incredibly tasty way to splurge.

Rest in peace, Billy. We’ll do our best to get by without your gadgets and screaming.

If you know beer you know what to drink when it’s this damn hot. But if you’re looking for an alternative to that chilled Chardonnay, you might need some help. I’d hate for you to start your summer beer-drinking with a mass-produced light beer with fake citrus flavors. No one deserves that. Let’s look at what makes a good summer beer, and who’s making good summer beer in St. Louis.

The beer brainiacs at Real Beer have a great name for summer brews: “lawnmower beers.” Its got to be the kind of drink that would taste so very good after an hour of huffing through the lawn in the sun. They also point out that although these beers taste great on a hot day, they’re not really going to quench your thirst. Alcohol dehydrates, so if you’re going to drink beer, make sure you drink lots and lots of water, too.

Now … what beer to drink? 

Lagers comprise the most common beers consumed in America. It’s the ubiquitous yellow fizzy beer that’s the bane of the beer snob. This doesn’t mean that there aren’t some great lagers, especially in a town with a German brewing history like ours, and their mild, slightly bitter flavor tastes light and pairs great with grilled food and salads. Pilsners are basically the same as lagers, but Czech in origin.

Local lagers available in bottles include Schlafly’s Summer Lager and Pilsner, and Charleville’s Pilsner. Lots of local lagers are only available on tap including Mattingly’s Billy Pilgrim’s Imperial Czech Pilsner, Morgan Street Brewing’s Honey Wheat, Square One’s Festival Lager, and Amalgamated’s Helles.

Hefewiezen is another German-style beer. This one contains lots of wheat and malt, and is unfiltered which gives it a light color and body. The malt gives it a sweetness which is balanced by a higher carbination. If you don’t like bitter, you’ll like hefes and there’s no lack of them around here. Schlafly has a regular Hefewiezen that’s sold year-round, but in the summer months they also have one with raspberry added. O’Fallon Brewery is also heavy on the hefes, including their award-winning Wheat and Wheach (wheat + peach) beers.

Wit Not just a description of its drinkers, wit is actually Belgian for “white”. They’re also called “witbier,” and they tend to be a bit on the sour side with low bitterness. Charleville has Half-Wit Wheat, which is just that – a marriage of a Belgian wheat beer and a Hefewiezen. At Mattingly you can get a cold draught BrightSide Belgian White.

Kolsch And we’re back to the Germans. Kolsch combines the lager and ale brewing techniques to create a beer that balances sweetness and bitterness in a pale brew. While bottle Kolsch is pretty fine – Schalfly and O’Fallon Gold are both tasty – it’s always better on tap. Augusta’s Blonde Ale is actually a Kolsch that leans toward the ale’s sweetness.

Of course, if you want to drink a heavy porter or stout in the summer, no one’s going to stop you. And anyone who makes fun of you might need to be cracked over the head with a bottle. As always, if you’re going to drink, drink what you like.

When I buy meat, I try to stick to local, small farms run by people who don’t mind if I pay them a visit to make sure the critters aren’t wallowing in their own feces. I want my meat to come from animals that lived comfortable, healthy lives that are as close to what nature intended as possible. Nevermind what label’s slapped on the finished product.

I’m a big fan of Hinkebein Hills Farm in Cape Girardeau. They’re regulars on the St. Louis farmer’s market circuit, and lots of excellent local restaurants features their products. I love that the Hinkebein family welcomes visitors to their farm, and that they do all of their own processing. The animals aren’t carted all over creation in atmosphere-wrecking trucks. They’re providing jobs for the local economy.

But really, it’s all about the sausage.

Hinkebein custom-makes umpteen varieties of sausage, all of them so tasty that I once gave a friend a cooler filled with them for her birthday. You know it’s good if it’s gift-worthy. Their onion pork sausage patties are my favorite, and we eat a lot of them in a variety of ways at my house. At $4/pound it’s hard to find yucky commercially-made sausage that’s such a bargin. With the onions included, they’re ready-made for patty melts. Don’t want to heat your kitchen? You can make these on the grill.

Porky Patty Melts

1 package Henkebein Hills Farm onion pork sausage patties (4 patties)

8 slices Companion rye batard bread

4 slices Ropp Jersey baby Swiss cheese

coarse-grained mustard

olive oil

1. Fire up your grill and cook the onion pork sausage patties until cooked through.
2. Assemble sandwiches with patties, cheese, and mustard on rye. Lightly brush outside of bread with olive oil. Place on the grill, flipping after the bottoms are toasty.

If you don’t like to play with fire, of course you can do this on the stove. But what fun is that? There’s nothing more natural than cooking with fire!

With a bounty this scarce, it’s a damn shame I’m a floret girl. Never been a fan of the stalks and I’ll admit, I’ve always been wasteful with them. Way back when I was in culinary school and we were taught that our restaurants would immediately go broke if we wasted so much as an onion skin, broccoli stalks = broccoli soup. But who wants heavy broccoli soup in June? I set out to make a soup that used those stalks without putting me into a cheese-and-cream heat coma.

Summer Broccoli Soup

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 5 broccoli stalks and leaves, shredded
• 2 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1/2 bunch green onions, chopped
• 1/2 cup roasted almonds
• 2 cups stock (veggie or chicken)
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 5.3 ounces plain, fat-free Greek yogurt
• shredded Parmesan cheese

1) Heat oil in a large pot. Add garlic, onions and almonds and saute for 30 seconds. Add shredded broccoli. Saute until bright green and fragrant.

2) Add stock and salt. Bring to a boil. Remove from heat and let carefully place in food processor (if you want a slightly crunchy soup) or blender (for a smooth version) with yogurt. Process or puree.

3) Top individual servings with freshly grated Parmesan cheese and cracked black pepper. Serves four.

My parents live near near factory farms owned by one of the largest poultry producers in the world. A whiff of one of their barns should be enough to make anyone eschew mass-produced chickens. And yet, switching to local poultry can be one of the hardest locavore changes to make. Being creatures of convenience, and of the generation that tends to turn up its noses at dark meat, it’s hard to go from those oh-so-easy packages of breasts and wings to a whole bird. Because most small farms don’t sell indiviual parts. You can get a whole chicken, or go without.

Over the past year my family has switched to whole, locally-raised chicken (with a few exceptions, mainly when the hot wing craving gets the best of us). A whole chicken has lots of possibilities. Few foods conjure the comfort of a perfectly roasted chicken. Or you can cram a can of beer up the chicken’s butt and throw it on the grill for some beer can chicken. If you know how to properly cut a chicken, you’ll be on your way to awesome grilled or fried bird.

There’s no lack of ways to prep a whole chicken. There is, often, a lack of time. Or a lack of cooking skills. The first one tends to be a big problem at my house. Dealing with a whole chicken can be time-consuming and labor-intensive. I’ve found a way to minimize the hands-on prep time for a whole bird while stretching the number of meals we get from it. And it’s so easy even the cooking skill-free people can handle it.

You do know that slow cookers are awesome, right? Of course you do. If you don’t have one, invest. You won’t be sorry.

Thaw your chicken. Check inside the bird and remove any innards. I know, some of you are squirming. That’s okay. You can wear gloves. If you don’t eat innards, they make a much-loved treat for your dogs and cats. I’m not a fan of hearts and gizzards, but I love chicken livers. I’d like to say that every time I prep a whole chicken, I toss the liver into a freezer bag until I have enough to make pate. Truth is, I usually toss it with some flour, salt, and pepper and fry it for immediate consumption. Consider it my reward for sticking my hand inside a chicken.

Place the chicken in the crock pot with three sliced carrots, two sliced stalks of celery, a chopped onion, and a handful of smashed garlic. Add water until the chicken is half submerged. Don’t add more water than that, because the chicken will produce its own juices while it cooks. You don’t want an overflow. Trust me.

Set the slow cooker to low and cook, 8-10 hours or until the chicken’s cooked through. Turn off the slow cooker and let sit 30 minutes before removing the chicken from the liquid. Be careful when you remove it, because your chicken will be so tender it will fall apart in your hands.

Once the chicken’s out, remove the skin and bones. The meat should easily shred. Put it in a bowl and refrigerate for up to four days. Mix up the dark and white meat. And don’t worry so much about dark meat’s bad reputation. If you’re using a free-range chicken, the fat content will be lower than a factory farmed one. Do the chicken in the picture look like they get any exercise? They don’t, which has the same effect on poultry as it has on humans.

You now have homemade chicken stock! It’s going to be super-rich, because any fat from the chicken will be in the liquid. If you want a skinnier version, place the stock in the fridge overnight. The fat will rise to the top and become solid by morning. You can remove it. Or you can leave the fat and dilute it with water if you want to make it go further.

If you leave the veggies in the stock, all you have to do is add cooked noodles and you’ve got homemade chicken noodle soup. There’s meal #1 from your bird. Remove the veggies, and you’ve got stock you can use in any recipe that calls for it.

As for that giant bowl of shredded chicken meat, use it in any recipe that requires chicken bits. Add to salads. Make chicken salad. Toss it with pasta, or make white chili. Heat a jar of curry sauce, make some basmati rice, and you’ve got quickie curry. Fill tacos or burritos. This green enchilada recipe’s my absolute favorite use for shredded chicken.

I’m sure you’ve got your own ideas for that chicken, which will easily make two fast, easy dinners. Share ‘em!

Where to get your St. Louis chicken? I get mine from Greenwood Farms.

Brace yourself, because the first weekend in June is full of foodie festival fun! Look what’s happening on June 5, 6 and 7…

• Friday night and all day Saturday, hit Belleville’s beautiful public square for the second annual Wine, Dine and Jazz festival. It’s just that – wine tastings (or gulpings), a food court comprised of some of the Metro East’s tastiest restaurants, and lots of live jazz. Admission’s free.
• On Saturday and Sunday, go a smidge north of Belleville and check out Collinsville’s International Horseradish Festival. Did you know that 60% of the world’s horseradish is grown in Collinsville? For real! The strip clubs aren’t the only spicy business in the Metro East. Come check out live music and lots of horseradish-based chow, including the annual Bloody Mary contest. Admission’s free, and the fun starts at 10 A.M. on both days.
• Are you more into beer than Bloody Marys? June 5th and 6th also brings the St. Louis Brewers Heritage Festival to the Upper Muny Fields at Forest Park. If you purchase tickets for the three-day festival now, they’re $30. They’ll be $35 if you buy them at the festival. This gives you the opportunity to sample brews from over 60 breweries and educational sessions from local brewmasters.

While this seems to be rather hush-hush, the Central West End will host its 15th annual Art Fair & Taste with yummies from some of the area’s best restaurants.

What else do you want? Ketchup?

That’s catsup to you, Buster. Come back to Collinsville on Sunday, July 12th for the 11th Annual World’s Largest Catsup Bottle Festival. This is summer festivaling at its finest – live music, a car show, beautu pageant, a visit from the World’s Largest Things Traveling Museum, catsup-covered hot dog eating competition, and of course, catsup taste tests.

You know what goes great with catsup? Mussels. No, not really. You’ve got almost two weeks to get the catsup taste out of your mouth before Schlafly hosts Belgian Beer & Mussel Mania at The Tap Room on July 24th and 25th, starting at 5 P.M. The largest locally-owned brewery will thumb their noses at that giant Belgian-owned brewery a few miles to the south with their own selection of hand-crafted Belgian-style beers and tasty mussels dishes with lots of live music.

Wanting to sample the world beyond Belgium? The annual Festival of Nations at Tower Grove Park happens on August 29th and 30th with over 30 different cultures offering their cuisine.

We’ll close the summer in downtown St. Louis with the Hispanic Festival at Soldier’s Memorial.

This isn’t a definitive list. I’m sure I’m missing some hidden gems. I’m anxiously awaiting the dates for Iron Barley’s annual Tomatofest and its tomato dish competition. Do you know of other foodie parties around town this summer? Tell us!

In a few weeks, the greens and sprouts will overlap summer’s fruit and veggie crops. When it does, get Greeky with this zippy, protein-loaded salad.

Great Greek Greens Salad

2 handfuls salad greens

1 handful radish sprouts

1 Roma tomato, diced

1/8 red onion, diced

1/4 cucumber, thinly sliced

2 ounces feta

1/2 cup canned chickpeas, drained and rinsed

juice of 1 lemon

1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

1 teaspoon dried oregano

1 clove garlic, crushed

salt & pepper

1. On a large dinner plate, layer salad greens, sprouts, tomato, onion, cucumber, feta, and chickpeas.
2. In a lidded container, combine lemon juice, olive oil, oregano, garlic, salt and pepper. Shake vigorously and drizzle over salad.
3. Serve with Companion Bakery’s rustic olive bread, which is fantastic when dipped in the lemon vinaigrette. You do realize that you made a vinaigrette in the second step, right?

Hit Claverach Farm for both your salad greens and radish sprouts, and be prepared to stand in line. It’s worth the wait. Trust me. While waiting, you might find yourself rubbing elbows with St. Louis’ culinary elite, like James Beard nominee Gerard Craft. If Chef Craft’s willing to wait for these greens, you know they’re awesome.

As for the radish sprouts, their flavor’s entirely different from the pea shoots I used a few weeks ago. They taste like, well, radishes. Except not nearly as overpowering. Mixed with the rest of the salad’s ingredients, the sprouts add a peppery spiciness that works beautifully with the strong Mediterranean flavors.

I had to buy my tomato, cucumber and red onion at the grocery store. Blah. You know they’ll be all over the place at the local farmer’s markets in a few weeks.

Like goat cheese? You can use it instead of conventional feta. Goatsbeard Farm from central Missouri sells their cheeses at lots of St. Louis locations.

Chickpeas? You’re probably going to have to get a can. I’m sorry. If I find a local source you’ll be the second to know, once I’m finished cramming fresh hummus down my gullet.

Lemons don’t grow in St. Louis. I have to tell my five-year-old this sad fact daily.

If you’re drinking a really pale beer with fake lime flavoring, you’re not drinking beer.

St. Louis is a beer town. Selling the biggest brewery in town can’t change that. There’s more to beer than the South Side behemouth. With St. Louis Craft Beer Week starting on May 30th, let’s take a look at what’s brewing in the Lou. But this is just the beginning. In future posts I’m going to write about all those different kinds of beers that can make your head spin. And not in the good way.

St. Louis Brewery, better known as Schlafly: Now the largest locally-owned brewery, it’s not hard to find Schlafly’s craft beers. They’re available at the brewery’s two restaurants – Schlafly Bottleworks and The Tap Room, along with tons of bars in the area and by the bottle at most beer retailers.

Morgan Street Brewery: This Laclede’s Landing brewpub offers their beers on tap and by the growler. That’s a half-gallon jug you can take home. They’re also available at Sundeckers, Harry’s, and Harpo’s.

Square One Brewery & Distillery: Located in Lafayette Square, where their beers are available on tap.

Alandale Brewing Company: Downtown Kirkwood’s brewpub , and the only place to try Alandale’s beers.

Lemp Beer: The oldest, and creepiest name in St. Louis beer. Try their lager at Lemp Mansion.

Mattingly Brewing Company: Hit this South City spot from Peek-a-Brew Wednesdays, when the crack open a new cask of microbrew.

Trailhead Brewing Company: This downtown St. Charles brewpub’s one of the oldest in the area. Their brews are available at their main location, and at Lewis and Clark’s, also on St. Charles’ Main Street.

O’Fallon Brewery: The Missouri O’Fallon, that is. This St. Charles County brewery does beer and that’s it. No restaurant. Just beer. You can find it in bottles at grocery and liquor stores throughout the area. Their 5 Day IPA won the RFT’s best beer award last year, and is available on tap around town.

Now that you know where to get it, what do you get? We’ll get to that soon.

With my “Very Entertaining” series, I’m going to write about yummy, easy dishes you can use to, well, entertain. I’ll talk about throwing parties, what to bring to parties, and occasionally, how to recover your dignity after parties. I’ve got to figure out how to do that last one.

In spite of my disdain for Rachel Ray, I’ll admit that this concoction eeks its way into the “Yummo! Let’s open some cans! Yummo! EVOO! Ouch, my vocal chords!” realm. I’m fighting the urge to apologize for that. Fact is, sometimes you need fast and easy, especially this time of year when impromptu cookouts start appearing. Make a day or two in advance, or right before you dash out the door. Either way, Black Bean Salad with Avocado Vinaigrette is, oh God don’t make me say it. Yummo. Kill me.

Black Bean Salad with Avocado Vinaigrette

2 14.5 ounce cans black beans, drained and rinsed

1 14.5 ounce can garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed

1/2 cup red onion, finely diced

1 jalapeno pepper, finely diced

1 cup arugula or spinach, shredded

2 limes

1 avocado

1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon chili powder

1 teaspoon dried oregano

salt and pepper

2 tablespoons honey

1. In a medium bowl, combine beans, onion, jalapeno, and arugula. Toss gently
2. In a container with a lid, squeeze the juice from both limes. Dice avocado directly into the lime juice. Gently shake, and let sit 10 minutes. Add olive oil, cumin, chili powder, oregano, salt, pepper and honey. Shake until fully mixed.
3. Pour avocado mixture over bean mixture. Stir thoroughly. Serve with tortilla chips.

Wanna know how this stuff works?

• While the recipe calls for canned beans, you can use dried beans if you cook them in advance. A one-pound bag of dried beans equals three 14.5 ounce cans once they’re cooked.

• Do you know the easy way to dice an onion? Here ya go.

• If you want more heat, keep the jalapeno’s seeds. If you prefer cooler, pitch the seeds. Is your tongue a delicate little flower that can’t handle volatile pepper oils? Fine. Use a green Anaheim chili pepper or, if you must, green bell pepper.

• Why arugula? Because that’s what was in my fridge.

• To get the most juice from your limes, they should be at room temperature. Before you cut them, roll them on the counter with a firm hand. Lime like that action. Don’t have a fancy-pants citrus juicer? Good. You don’t need one. Just cut the lime, jam a fork in the middle, and twist.

• Avocados should feel a little soft when you give them a squeeze. If they don’t give it up, they’re not ready.

• Do you know the easy way to dice an avocado? Here ya go. For this recipe, dice the avocado smaller than he does.

• Most important step: let the avocado sit in the lime juice! The acid in the lime will keep the avocado from turning black and nasty.

• Got some left over from the party? Roll it into a tortilla. Voila. Black bean and avocado wrap for lunch.