Everything Peach

Summer weather is here and I just can't wait for my favorite roadside farm stand to sell all those fragrant peaches which are just pure summer time under some fuzzy skin. But until local peaches are available, it will probably be another six weeks or so.

I literally could not wait though, so I bought some peaches at the grocery store, labelled as "Southern peaches", wherever they may be from... Also the blueberries looked plump and juicy, and they could go into my first peach crisp of the season as well. This recipe is absolutely addicting.

I try to convince myself that it must be sort of healthy with the oatmeal topping.... if it just wasn't for all the butter and sugar! But it is oh so good. I had always been a little suspicious of recipes for cobblers and crisps that have fruit on the bottom, thinking it would be a juicy, and eventually soggy, mess. But the cornstarch really takes care of that problem and makes it all hold together nicely. This is best enjoyed warm out of the oven, or at room temperature.

I paired this peach dessert with -surprise, surprise- a peach wine from Linganore Winecellars in Maryland. This is labelled as a semi-sweet wine, and first I thought that must surely be an understatement, but they are right, it's pleasantly semi-sweet, not cloyingly sweet, as some might expect. And it almost goes without saying, that it of course tastes like wonderfully ripe peaches.

I have to admit, part of me must be a little bit of a wine snob, as every time I am at a wine tasting, and we get to a wine on the list that is a pure fruit wine (meaning from fruit other than grapes), or a wine blended with other fruit than grapes, I just ever so slightly lift at least one eye brow and have a quizzical expression on my face. On a bad day, you might even detect an eye roll...

But then I take a sip, and if it's a well-made fruit wine, it instantly transports me back to my college days. For a moment, I am carefree and 21 again... And how can that be a bad thing? Love the peach wine, but give me a strawberry wine, and I become downright nostalgic... There was this great place in my college town where we would go for strawberry wine in the summer. It was up on a hill, and the city lights were below and just the stars above us... Ah well, let me just stop, but my college friends will know exactly the place I am talking about.

The peach wine with the peach crisp... just perfect for the summer. The cinnamon and ginger in the crisp with the fruity wine create something really magical. And really, it's not too sweet. I would call this an amazing combination!