Baking with Dorie: A Cobbler to Coo Over
You know how cooks are always cooing about how easy summer is? "I just put some stuff on the grill, toss a salad and it's dinner," they'll say. Well, we bakers can coo, too. Try this: "I just toss some fruit in a pan, cover it with a quick dough and it's dessert."
What it really is, is a cobbler, and it's fast, just about foolproof, great tasting and perfect for showing off summer's berries and fruits. Actually, it's not bad for just plain showing off either.
A cobbler is about the most flexible dessert you can think of it. In fact, it may even have gotten its name because of its flexibility: you can cobble it together with just about anything you've got around. That it's not meant to look neat, clean and tidy is only another of its virtues, and probably what earned it its sister name: pandowdy, that is, something that looks dowdy (what a great word) in the pan. (Truth in advertising: it looks pretty dowdy in a bowl or on a plate, too.)
