These last weeks of summer seem to inspire a canning frenzy -- from tomatoes and basil to cucumbers, peaches and berries -- as we try to capture a taste of sunshine for the deep winter days to come. A friend recently shared her wealth of sour cherries from a backyard in Anchorage. After preparing the fruit for jams and compote I had some left over to balance out spicy salsas and to roast for a fresh mozzarella salad.
But all that cherry goodness had me yearning for something sweet and quick. I topped my family's breakfast yogurt and oatmeal with the cooked-down fruit (adding some flax seed and pistachio), but also remembered my grandmother's peach stove-top slump cake; it was one of the few desserts she made when my grandfather, the main cook in the family, allowed her into the kitchen. It wasn't pretty, but the dumpling-like topping seeped into the juices of the fruit and made for a very satisfying treat.
Desserts with names like slump and dump and buckle don't necessarily win as many beauty prizes as their well-mannered cousins, cobblers and crisps. But these vintage treats -- prepared stove-top (where you dump and they slump) or oven-baked (where they buckle and grunt) -- could easily be awarded "most likeable" for their ease of preparation and crowd-pleasing attributes.
Extra cherry pie filling is perfect for this. But wild Alaska berries or other seasonal fruit cooked down in sugar and lemon would do just as well. For the dumpling topping, I like the combination of cornmeal mixed with either all-purpose or Alaska barley flour. Serve with whipped cream, crème fraîche or your favorite vanilla ice cream.
Slump might not be the fairest of them all, but it's easier than pie and will win more than its share of votes.
Kim Sunée is the best-selling author of "Trail of Crumbs: Hunger, Love, and the Search for Home." She ate and lived in Europe for 10 years before working as a food editor for Southern Living magazine and Cottage Living magazine. Sunée has appeared several times as a guest judge on Food Network's "Iron Chef America." She lives in Anchorage, and her latest cookbook is "A Mouthful of Stars." For more food and travel, visit kimsunee.com or instagram.com/kimsunee.
Cherry-vanilla slump cake
Makes 4 to 6 servings
4 cups homemade cherry pie filling or compote
1/2 cup fine-grind cornmeal or cornflour, preferably Bob's Red Mill
1/2 cup all-purpose flour or Alaska barley flour
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
Pinch of salt
1/2 vanilla bean, cut in half lengthwise (or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract)
8 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
1 egg, lightly beaten
For serving: vanilla ice cream, whipped cream or crème fraîche
1. Gently warm cherry pie filling or compote in an 8-inch skillet over medium-low heat.
2. Make topping by combining flour, cornmeal, baking powder, sugar and salt in the bowl of a food processor; pulse a few times to combine ingredients. Scrape the seeds from the vanilla bean into the flour mixture. Add butter and pulse again until butter is combined with flour and resembles small peas. Add egg and pulse until just combined.
3. When cherry mixture is slightly thickened, use a large spoon to drop batter onto the fruit mixture. Cover with a lid and cook over medium heat, undisturbed, about 25 minutes until dumplings are cooked through and no longer sticky. Serve with ice cream, whipped cream or crème fraîche.