Haute August Nights

For those who hate to cook, the August farmers’ market is Xanadu. Any summertime sleuth can leave the market with enough peak-of-the-season, almost-ready-to serve produce to carry them through a week of dinners. These latter-day happy meals can be effortlessly assembled from vine-ripened tomatoes paired with fragrant fresh basil and a drizzle of golden California olive oil; crunchy cucumbers with spicy red onions; and ears of sweet corn briefly blanched or grilled—or scraped off the cob and added raw to salads. Quick-to-cook summer squash abounds, just begging to line up on the grill with fat eggplants and a rainbow of sweet bell peppers. There’s always a selection of crusty artisan breads on hand for sandwiches and bruschetta and such.

And impromptu desserts can be fashioned without difficulty from the abundance of juicy plums, pluots, peaches, nectarines, watermelons, cantaloupes and their various cousins, and bodacious berries galore. Kitchen duty is easy peasy. But for those of us who love to cook, the options are even more irresistible.

I’ll let you in on a closely guarded secret: boysenberries are my hands-down all-time favorite fruit. Even as a kid, I remember first tasting them and thinking, “Oh yeah. This is it,” even when I knew of nothing better than to scatter them over my breakfast cereal. To me, they epitomize the perfect balance of tart-to-sweet; and are just as good eaten fresh as they are baked. The fact they are rarely seen in supermarkets only adds to their mystique.

Lately, each week I have had Big Plans to buy enough boysenberries to whip up a vat of jam I’ll be able to savor throughout the coming year, but my precious bounty is usually depleted way too soon…starting with the ride home from the farmers’ market, when it’s far too easy to just pop these little bad boys into my mouth, one right after another. (sigh)

Boysenberry season is woefully brief —a nd this month signals their swan song at the farmers’ market. So I now conjure up all the fortitude I can muster and bravely force myself to spread the boysenberry gospel to others, in the form of my favorite cobbler.

There are a zillion different types of cobbler toppings, and most of them are divine. (But then, I’ve yet to meet a carbohydrate I didn’t like. But that’s a whole other story.) This particular cobbler is geared toward those of us who crave good pie crust as much as whatever might happen to be inside of it. Filled with boysenberries lightly punctuated with sweet nectarines, this cobbler embodies the flavors of a world-class pie—without any of the angst that often goes along with making one. In this case, conventional beauty plays a secondary role to taste. Think of it as a deep-dish crostata.

The crushed sugar cubes on top — a nod to American cooking legend Edna Lewis — provide a sweet bit of added texture. If you don’t have any sugar cubes hidden away in the pantry, just sprinkle granulated sugar over the top. No one is going to complain.

Boysenberry-Nectarine Cobbler
For the crust:

• 5 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, plus 1 tablespoon softened butter for greasing the dish
• 4 tablespoons solid vegetable shortening
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup ice water

For the filling:

• 2/3 cup granulated sugar
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 4 cups fresh boysenberries*
• 2 cups very coarsely chopped (1-inch chunks) pitted nectarines
• 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
• 1 tablespoon cold butter, cut into bits

For the topping:

• 4 sugar cubes, coarsely crushed, or 2 teaspoons granulated sugar

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To make the cobbler crust: Cut the cold butter into 1/2-inch cubes, and divide the shortening into pieces about the same size. Place on a plate and freeze until very firm, about 30 minutes.

In a food processor, combine the flour and salt. Process briefly to combine. Add the frozen butter and shortening and process, pulsing the machine on and off, until the irregularly-sized pieces of fat are coated with flour. With the machine running, gradually pour in the ice water. Process just until the mixture is evenly moistened yet still appears somewhat crumbly, with pea-size pieces of fat visible throughout the dough. (The dough should be just starting to come together—it should NOT form a ball.) Turn out the mixture onto a large piece of plastic wrap and knead a couple of times to form a uniform disk. Cover with the plastic wrap and refrigerate until firm, at least 30 minutes or overnight.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Butter the inside of a 9-by-2-inch (deep dish) pie plate or other shallow 2-quart baking dish. Refrigerate the buttered baking dish while you prepare the rest of the recipe.

To make the filling: In a large bowl, whisk together the sugar, cornstarch, and salt to blend. Add the berries and nectarines, and sprinkle with lemon juice. Toss gently to coat with the sugar mixture

On a lightly floured surface, roll the chilled pastry into a raggedy 14- to 15-inch circle. Then roll the pastry over the rolling pin, window-shade fashion, and ease it into the chilled pie plate, letting the excess pastry drape over the edges of the plate. Scrape the fruit mixture and any accumulated juices into the pastry and dot with butter. Fold the excess pastry up over the filling, pleating if needed. The pastry will not cover the all fruit; if any pieces of pastry have fallen off, just patch them on top. (Don’t go for perfection here; you want to topping to have a rustic appearance.) Sprinkle the crushed sugar cubes over the pastry. Bake until the filling is bubbly-hot and the crust is golden, 45 to 50 minutes. Let cool at least 30 minutes before serving. Serve slightly warm or at room temperature. ((This is best served the same day it is made. If made early in the day, it can be reheated, uncovered, in a 325 degree oven.) Serves 6 generously…or possibly more, when served alongside vanilla ice cream or frozen yogurt.

Just make sure you stash away enough cobbler for your own breakfast the next morning. You’ll hate yourself if you don’t.

* I find the 3-packs of boysenberries sold by several growers at the farmers’ market usually equal about 4 cups of berries. Substitute blackberries, if you like. That will leave more boysenberries at the market for me. Maybe then I’ll make that jam after all.

The Danville Certified Farmers’ Market, located at Railroad and Prospect, is open every Saturday, rain or shine, from 9 a.m. until 1 p.m. For specific crop information call the Pacific Coast Farmers’ Market Association at 1-800-949-FARM or visit their web site at www.pcfma.com.