Early Peaches in a Pie

I've heard about the Dry Creek Peach stand for years, but it's up by Geyserville and I don't travel to that part of the county often, so I never visited. A few days ago I read that they already had peaches...about two weeks earlier than usual. I love peaches, but the ones that I get in the market are uninspiring. They tend to be hard and with little flavor. You can ripen them in a brown paper bag, but then they are ripe and still flavorless, plus they are often bruised with large dark areas from rough handling when they were hard.

So Sweetie and I found that we had the time, so we drove up the the Dry Creek Peach stand and purchased a flat of the first peaches of the season. The Dry Creek Peach folks were delightful and since they grow 30 varieties, we will likely be visiting them again and again. 

The peaches! They are heavenly! Because they were picked ripe, the skins come off easily...no need to dip them in boiling water to loosen the skins. They are also wonderfully juicy and full of peach flavor.

Of course we started eating them plain. Sweetie even ate his with the peel still on. I prefer them without the peel. Then I combined them with some other fresh fruit we had on hand...raspberries, pineapple and banana. Delicious!

The next day I made a peach pie with them and it is a really great pie. It took about 6 peaches to make the filling. I used a ready made pie dough crust for the bottom, made a filling with those slices peaches, freshly ground nutmeg, some flour and cornstarch mixed and a tablespoon of lemon juice. They were sweet enough that I didn't add any sugar. On top I put a streusel of brown sugar, flour, butter and chopped pecans. I'm afraid that the streusel  burned a bit during the first part of the baking, but I covered the whole top with foil for the 350 degree F part and it didn't burn any more. Next time I'll cover it sooner.

This is an exceptional pie, especially if you use tree ripened fruit. True peach season in most of the U.S is in June and July, so see if you can find some good peaches...and have some pie!

Peach Pie with Streusel Topping

5 cups peeled, sliced peaches, pits discarded

1/4 cup all-purpose flour mixed with 1 tablespoon cornstarch

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg, freshly grated if possible

few grains of salt

3/4 cup brown sugar

3/4 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 cup chopped pecans

8 oz. (1/2 cup, 1 stick) soft butter

one egg white

one 9” unbaked pie shell ( put into freezer until ready to fill the pie)

Mix peach slices with flour mixture,  lemon juice, nutmeg and salt. Pile into chilled pie shell that has been brushed with slightly beaten egg white. 

Make the streusel: In a medium bowl mix together the brown sugar, flour and pecans. Add the soft butter, cut into pieces, and use clean fingers to smoosh the butter into the flour mixture until combined. The mixture will be barely crumbly.

Break apart the streusel mixture into small-ish lumps and scatter evenly over the peach filling.

Bake in a preheated 425 degree F oven for 10 minutes. Place foil over edges of pie shell if they start to become too brown or if the top becomes too brown. Reduce heat to 350 degrees F and bake about 45 minutes, or until filling is bubbly and crust is golden brown.

Let cool at least five minutes before serving. I served mine at room temperature.

My Mom's NOTES: The filling (without the streusel topping) can be frozen: Line 9” pie pan with heavy foil and put in peach mixture. Fold over and seal the foil. Put into a zip lock bag (gallon size) and freeze. When ready to bake, continue as above, putting frozen pie filling into an unbaked pie shell brushed with egg white as above. You can do the same thing with the apple pie filling. You may have to bake either pie with frozen filling 10 minutes or so longer.