Cherry Cobbler

"If you take cranberries and stew them like applesauce they taste much more like prunes than rhubarb does. Now, you tell me what you know."
– Groucho Marx, Animal Crackers, 1930

Last night Mother told me about her day picking and pitting pie cherries this week. Yum! She worked for hours. She's going to make cobbler from it. Double yum! But her favorite cobbler recipe is in a book she gave away -- to me, for Christmas 2005.

So now that I have the book, I promised her I'd send her the recipe. Here it is...

from Betty Crocker's Picture Cook Book, Revised and Enlarged, Fourth Edition, 1956:

"Cobble up" means to put together in a hurry. For the fruit, use cherries, peaches, apricots, or blackberries, etc.

FRESH FRUIT COBBLER
Follow recipe below - except, in place of canned fruit or berries, use 3 cups fresh fruit with any juice there might be, mixed with 2/3 to 1 cup sugar, 1 tbsp. cornstarch, and 1 cup water.

Mix in saucepan...
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1 tbsp. cornstarch
Stir in gradually...
  • 2 1/2 cups canned fruit or berries and juice (no. 2 can)
Bring to boil and boil 1 min., stirring constantly. Pour into 1 1/2-qt. baking dish and dot with butter. Sprinkle with cinnamon. Sift together...
  • 1 cup sifted GOLD MEDAL Flour
  • 1 tbsp. sugar
  • 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp. salt
Cut in with pastry blender or 2 knives until mixture looks like "meal"...
3 tbsp. shortening
Stir in...
  • 1/2 cup milk
Drop by spoonfuls onto hot fruit or berries. Bake until golden brown. Serve warm with juice and cream.

TEMPERATURE: 400° (mod. hot oven).
TIME: Bake 25 to 30 min.
AMOUNT: 6 to 8 servings