I love it when people invite us over for dinner, I ask what I can bring, and they say dessert. Recipes start filling my brain – from chocolate to fruit, brownies to cookies, it just doesn’t end. Usually I end up going to the pantry and finding some recipe that I have not made before, but I am dying to try.
This scenario played out exactly the other weekend. I looked at all the fruit sitting on my counter, and decided that I must make a crisp. After all, I didn’t want all those delicious apricots, plums and peaches sitting there to go bad. I found a perfect crisp recipe from Cooking Light that I was excited to try, and I was set. Now, somewhere between making that decision, and actually making the dessert – something happened. I ended up at Cost-Co, and a tray of peaches were staring at me in the face. I decided that if I used up all the fruit I had in the house, I would need to buy more – and somehow I convinced myself to buy this ridiculously large flat.
Two hours before we were supposed to be at our friend’s house – I started making the crisp. That’s when everything really went wrong. I started cutting up the peaches that I thought were ripe, and they were not. I tried to take a few from Cost-co to use – but those were not much better. I had to make a quick decision…try and get as many peaches as I could to make half a batch of crisp, then make some chocolate chip cookies to supplement. I was really hoping that when the crisp cooked, that the peaches would soften, and no one would know they were not ripe. That was exactly what happened. The crisp was fantastic. And why does the color look so dark? Because I couldn’t peel the skins, so I left them on – and they cooked beautifully. The 6 adults polished it off completely – and the kids enjoyed the chocolate chip cookies. Stay tuned for what I did for the rest of the peaches when they were finally ripe…
Ingredients
- 8 1/2 cups sliced peaches
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar
- 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
- 1/4 teaspoon grated whole nutmeg
- Cooking spray
- 1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
- 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
- 3.4 ounces all-purpose flour (about 3/4 cup)
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 cup butter, melted
- 4 cups vanilla low-fat ice cream
Preparation
Combine first 6 ingredients in a large bowl; let stand 15 minutes.
Preheat oven to 400°.
Spoon fruit mixture into a 13 x 9-inch glass or ceramic baking dish coated with cooking spray. Bake at 400° for 35 minutes or until bubbly.
Combine oats and next 3 ingredients (through salt) in a bowl. Drizzle with butter, stirring until crumbly. Sprinkle oat mixture over fruit. Bake an additional 15 minutes or until topping is lightly browned and fruit is bubbly. Serve warm with ice cream.
Serves 12.
For a printer-friendly version of this recipe, please click here: Peach Crisp
Dawn
I love making desserts for dinner parties as well. It’s really the only way to go. This crisp looks delicious! Thank god for the softening powers of roasting!
Thanks – and thanks for being my 500th comment!!!!
Dawn, i just made this exact same dessert tonight. We had planned a wonderful dinner for my in-laws and somehow forgot about the dessert. I remembered I had frozen peaches and blueberries in the freezer so I used those. I’ve had it before with fresh fruit and honestly my palate isn’t sophisticated enough to taste the difference. I applaud you for using fresh peaches — I’m just lazy.