If It's July, It's Cherry Season

If you read this week's column, you'll learn that I had a HUGELY difficult time trying to find my beloved tart cherries here in Toledo. But, after all the mishigas, there was success! A lovely woman named Bonnie read my saga, told me of a farm market not too far away, even called the market to reserve two quarts of cherries for me (people are astoundingly nice here!), and thus ... before and after.

Cherry Almond Cake and The Saga of the Michigan Cherry Crop

I am apparently famous for my love of tart cherries.  My friend Jean, of Delightful Repast, even wrote to me recently and said, "I had last night's dessert for breakfast ....  Actually, I thought of YOU because of what I was eating.  Cherry upside-down cake ....  I always think of Michigan when I have cherries!"

Michigan is the #1 producer of tart cherries, and their short season usually coincides with the 4th of July.  But crops throughout the state were utterly destroyed earlier this year, as detailed in this article from the Michigan Farm Bureau:

"The degree to which western Michigan orchards have been wrecked this spring has most people in and near the agriculture industry talking in extremes, but even words like 'disaster,' 'catastrophic,' 'devastated' and 'decimated' seem inadequate after witnessing the situation firsthand ....  Wet, heavy snow broke thousands of branches in late winter. Then two weeks of summerlike temperatures in March tricked everything into budding four to six weeks ahead of schedule. A brutal April inflicted more than twice as many damaging frosts and freezes than normal. Water-gorged buds were frozen dead, making the trees themselves vulnerable to bacterial canker."

The ramifications of this situation go far beyond a threat to my annual cherry pitting fest and baking spree.   "What would you do if you lost 80, 85, 90, 95 or 100 percent of your family's income for a year?" asks one cherry grower from the northwest part of the state.  Many farmers say that it's not even worth bothering to harvest the meager crop, leaving summer workers without jobs.  And then the ripples will spread to shops, to entertainment venues, and to all the other places where lost income might have been spent.  It is tragic, truly, on an unimaginable scale.

And yet, there are glimmers of brightness in the cherry world.  Because when I was at the Farmers Market on Saturday morning, Kapnick Orchards from Britton had - gasp! - tart cherries for sale!  They told me they'd lost 50% of their crop, but they were happily selling these gorgeous fruits that had survived the onslaught.

These aren't the Balatons that I usually buy along with the bright red Montmorencies.  These are an entirely new variety for me to bore my loved ones with too many details about: Meteor cherries, which have dark skins, clear juice, freestone pits, tart flavor, and strong resistance to disease.  I bought two quarts, and hauled out my late grandmother's cherry pitter.

I know that most people would simply purchase a ready-made pie, or at least buy prepared cherries for baking.  And then there's lil' ol' moi.  I walk out into the back yard with a large bowl of cherries, a smaller bowl for the pits, another large bowl to hold the pitted fruits, and my MP3 player.   Then I sit in the sun engaging in my annual meditative process of picking up a cherry, plunking the stone out of it, and then depositing it into a different bowl before repeating the process several hundred more times.  And I love it so!

There is immense satisfaction not only in baking from scratch, but in baking with fruits I've processed myself.  And this almond-topped sour cream cake is a perfect way to use some of the cherry bounty.  It's rich, moist, delicate, crispy, crumbly, sweet, tart, and ideal with a cup of coffee or a glass of milk ... or, frankly, all by itself.

Cherry Almond Cake

Cherries:
1 cup tart cherries, chopped
1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1/8 teaspoon almond extract

Cake:
1/4 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup sour cream
1 egg
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon aluminum-free baking powder
1 cup flour

Topping:
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1/3 cup sliced almonds
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoons melted butter
confectioners' sugar

Cook cherries: Combine all ingredients in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring constantly. Cook 1-2 minutes until thickened. Remove from heat and let cool to room temperature.

Bake cake: Preheat oven to 350F. Grease an 8"-round cake pan, line bottom of pan with foil, then grease foil.

In a large mixing bowl, combine butter, sour cream, and egg; add sugar, salt, baking soda, and baking powder. Stir in flour, then pour batter into prepared pan.

Place dollops of cherries onto batter, then swirl in gently; smooth batter.

Combine brown sugar, almonds, cinnamon, and butter for topping; dollop over cake and spread a bit. Bake for 40 minutes until a tester comes out clean. Let cool in pan, then turn out into a serving platter.  Dust with confectioners' sugar.

Serves 8-12, depending upon serving size.

Cherry Cobbler for Two

The 4th of July isn't about fireworks or parades for me; it's about tart cherries. That's when the season begins, and I start the hunt for the gorgeous red fruits that are only available for a few short weeks each summer.

I'm so infamous for my love of the beautiful cherries that my loved ones also take it upon themselves to engage in the search. While I'm at work during the various farmers' market times, they all go out on reconnaissance missions to see what's available. Are the Montmorencies (traditional pie cherries which are bright red) at their peak, or are the Balatons (a darker and slightly sweeter variety of tart cherry) now ready? Then, if the prize is found, there are the text messages and phone calls to inquire how many quarts - yes, quarts! - I want.

Each of us has our own summer traditions. Other people go camping or have family reunions. I sit outside and remove the stones from hundreds of cherries with my late grandmother's cherry pitter. It's relaxing - almost meditative. And there is supreme satisfaction in baking with cherries that one has prepared oneself, rather than merely opening an inferior can of pie filling.

Whether you use frozen or jarred cherries, or invest the time to pit your own fresh ones, do please find a way to make this recipe. It's quick, it's simple, and it's such a perfect summer treat! There's just a hint of almond shining through to enhance the cherries, and the fruit's sweet-tart combination is an ideal complement to the light cake-like topping.

This was an ideal dessert to share with Tom one recent weekend evening, topped with a generous dollop of whipped cream. Yes, he's back! We're either utter fools or hopeless romantics ... we're in favor of the latter. Some things are just a matter of bashert [bah-SHAYRT], which is Hebrew for "destiny." So today we're celebrating our 19 month anniversary ... :)



Individual Cherry Cobblers
(adapted from Marcia Adams' Cooking From Quilt Country: Hearty Recipes from Amish and Mennonite Kitchens)

Cherries:
2 cups pitted sour cherries
1/2 cup sugar
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1/4 teaspoon almond extract

Topping:
3/4 cup unbleached flour
1 teaspoon aluminum-free baking powder
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
3 tablespoons butter, softened
1 egg
1/4 cup half-and-half
2 tablespoons brown sugar

Preheat oven to 400F. Grease two 1-1/4 cup ramekins, and place onto a baking sheet.

In a medium mixing bowl, combine all ingredients for the cherries; divide among the ramekins.

In the same bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt; with a fork, mix in the butter until the mixture is crumbly. Stir in the egg and the half-and-half until well combined; divide among the ramekins and spread the batter to the edges of the ramekins (but the cherries don't need to be fully covered).

Sprinkle 1 tablespoon brown sugar over each ramekin.

Bake for 30 minutes until golden and a toothpick inserted into the topping comes out clean. Serve warm or at room temperature, with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream as an accompaniment.

Serves 2.

"Babette's Feast"

"Babette's Feast" is one of my very favorite movies, and watching it is on the "to do" list for my boyfriend and me because Tom hasn't seen it yet (which surprised me greatly when I learned that).  Yeah, I took it out of the library, oh, maybe 2 weeks ago; and we keep saying "We need to watch this" ... but it doesn't seem to happen. 

But it needs to, because this movie addresses issues of great interest to me -- belief in God, how best to worship (austerity and asceticism vs. gratitude for bounty), sacrifice and obligation ....  And, obviously, there is the sumptuous porn of the food in the feast of the title!  Needless to say, I vote for relishing abundance (while also seeking better distribution of resources such that the "no need for ... hunger" that John Lennon sang about might one day come true).

We've just celebrated Purim, and been immersed in the requisite hamantaschen.    Every year, there are debates about the merits of sugar cookie dough vs. yeast dough, of poppy seed filling vs. prune ... and why???  They're cookies -- enjoy!  Don't make some of them feel rejected because they might not be your very favorites.  I can't imagine turning any of them down, unless I've simply eaten too many and am on the verge of a diabetic coma.

I've known people who don't like chocolate (gasp!!!), who won't eat orange food, who haven't liked cheese on pizza, who would only eat tuna salad with oily tuna that hadn't been drained, who won't eat chicken unless it's boneless, and who've told me they don't like foods that they haven't even bothered to try -- people with food issues are very, very high on my "naughty" list, unless they've got health or religious reasons to justify their refusals.  It's one thing if you CAN'T eat a particular food, but quite another if you CHOOSE not to ... especially if your whims are going to inconvenience others, and you seek to impose your will upon them.  Eat what's put in front of you, or hit the McDonald's drive-thru for a Big Mac if you're still hungry after playing with the food on your plate rather than eating it.

So, clearly -- after my disbelief at the prospect of rejecting any cookie, and after my rant about picky and particular people -- it should be clear that I am truly a Food Floozie to the depths of my Pooh Bear-like rumbly little tumbly.    (Watch my favorite Pooh scene, in which he tries to do some exercises: "Up, down, touch the ground, puts me in the mood/Up, down, touch the ground, in the mood ... for food!") 

Any food -- from soup to nuts to chips to chocolate to cake to cookies to chicken to roast beast to salad to cheese -- has the potential to lure me in, singing a Siren song until I can no longer resist temptation.  I go on curry kicks, will eat Sander's milk chocolate fudge sauce (that my maternal grandmother used to bring as a gift when she'd visit us in NYC) straight out of the jar, obsess about Montmorency and Balaton cherries at the Farmers Market each summer, and generally spend far too many of my waking hours contemplating what I'm going to eat, how I'm going to prepare it, what newfangled treatment I can give it, and how much I enjoyed it.

I do consider fat or sodium or sugar contents, but then do my best to simply enjoy myself despite any warning signs; if I exercise moderation as a rule and am in good health, then I can certainly indulge my whims and cravings without regret.  Really, there are just too many wonderful, delicious things to eat in this world -- from fruits and vegetables to pasta and fish, and from Indian and Ethiopian to Turkish and Irish ... I wax rhapsodic, I effuse, I enthuse, and I relish the complete sensual experience that food provides.  It is not just about nutrients; food can truly be good for the soul.

And Girl Scout cookies only come around once each year, after all, so who am I to refuse ... or to only eat just one???