It has been SO long. The last four months have been filled with some amazing travel, very special time with family and dear friends, and the food. . . Oh the food. So much to tell. I also discovered that I am quite a grouchy person if I don’t have a creative “outlet.” Just ask my mother, I am a demanding first child. Or better now, ask my husband. But to just cook and move on is not enough. So in taking a “little break” from “the blog” to do “other things,” I found a growing urge to order executions without trial. Wait, sorry, my inner-Spanish-dictator taking over. Anyway, all you mommys understand, Mommy needs a little time to enjoy what makes me tick. And tock.

So, in getting back to sharing my love for food, wine, and art, I thought I’d share a simple recipe that has its roots in my lifelong love for food and tradition.

As we do at the end of every summer, we spent a beautiful weekend on the Western Slope of Colorado visiting my grandparents, the great-grandparents to our girls. It’s a very special time, and when we are in Cedaredge, CO, with Grandma and Grandad Dickerson, there are peaches to be picked!

 There was a frost during springtime this year, so the crop for Palisade peaches was pretty sparse (and you should have seen the price/pound!). But Cedaredge is at a much higher elevation, so the fruit trees don’t blossom until later, and in this case, they missed all that cold weather. My grandparents’ trees were laden with delicious, high altitude fruit. One of these days, we should really keep track of how much we pick, but this year it ended up being boxes and boxes, and “hey, how much room do you have in your car” kind of quantity.

 We hauled off quite the load, and we made lots of peach jam, my sister Emily and my mom made the most delicious peach leather, and they even canned several jars of halved peaches. But we all agree, eating those peaches fresh is probably the ultimate treat. And slicing them into a galette is one of my favorite uses of a few fresh peaches. The flavor becomes more intense with a little roasting, and the super rustic crust highlights the simple yet delicious fruit.

Peach Galette

recipe by Stephanie Kunstle

Note: the beauty of a galette is that it’s pretty hard to “mess up!” It’s what you do with the fruit on the counter that’s ready to eat, so just make your pastry dough, and then sweeten the fruit a little (how much does depend on how sweet it already is), and bake it to imperfect perfection.

Ingredients:

• one recipe for pastry dough HALVED (the full recipe makes enough for 2 crusts, and you just need one for this)
• 5-6 peaches, sliced, skins kept on
• 1 Tbsp. cornstarch
• about 1/2 cup of sugar (I used a lavender scented sugar that was on hand, and it was a fun twist, but any sugar will do).
• parchment paper
• milk (not skim) or table cream for brushing on the crust

Preparation:

1. Preheat oven to 375°F.
2. Combine sliced peaches, sugar, and cornstarch in a bowl.
3. On a floured surface, roll out your pastry dough to about 1/8 inch thick.
4. Transfer dough to a jelly roll pan covered in parchment paper
5. Arrange fruit in the center of the dough, leaving about 3 inches of space around the edges.
6. Fold the edges in, overlapping when needed, to form a rough crust.
7. Brush the crust with the milk/cream.
8. Bake at 375°F until fruit juices bubble and the crust is brown (30-40 minutes, or so, depending on your elevation).
9. I like to cool my galette on a large wooden cutting board — it allows for cooling and I like serving it this way, plus there’s less chance of breaking or dropping the galette while transferring to a cooling rack and serving dish (risks I personally like to avoid).
10. Serve with a little whipped cream or sweet cream ice cream.