Ep 49: Small Bites: Simply Peachy

Written By Christine Van Bloem

Check out Small Bites, with episodes 15 minutes or less here to teach you what to do to make summer ingredients shine and how to make dinner…fast!

Episode 4 explores various ways to enjoy gorgeous ripe peaches. From simple sliced peaches to gourmet salads and savory meat pairings, find recipes and tips that highlight the natural sweetness and versatility of peaches. Keep it simple and let the flavors shine. 

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  • How's that song go? Millions of peaches. Peaches for me, because let me tell you, it is the time for peaches. Welcome to the Empty Nest kitchen, where we're finding fun in the kitchen. Now that the kids have flown the coop, I'm Christine Van Bloon, a cooking teacher with over 25 years of experience here to show you tips, tricks, and joy in your kitchen, all while trying something new. Let's get cooking. We are in the thick of it, and there is nothing, and I mean nothing better than a perfectly ripe. Peach. We love'em. Whether you're driving down the highway and see that South Carolina peach butt, which is really a giant water tower, or you're going to Georgia, but let me tell you here in the Mid-Atlantic, we have got some peaches too. And the whole idea now is what are you gonna do with Nature's perfect specimen? Am I peach biased? Of course I am. Is it the last thing I want to eat? In my life, yes, of course it is, because there is nothing like that sweet stickiness that you get with a peach, but. How are you going to use it? Because truthfully, I think there's nothing better than just a peach. My mom used to always slice the peaches, maybe peel the peaches, I don't even remember if she peeled them, peel the peaches and put sugar on them and talk about gilding the lily man, if a peach is rip and in season it doesn't need anything, it doesn't need a touch of sugar. But because my mom did it, I do it too. And what it does when you put sugar or salt even on something that's called macerating, and I know you wanna enunciate that, but macerating is when you basically are putting sugar salt on something and. Pulls the liquids out of what it's, so it could be if you're salting cucumbers, or in my case, putting a little bit of sugar on that perfect sliced peach Now. Can you do more with a peach than slice two of them and have them in a bowl for breakfast every morning? Of course you can, but part of my mantra for summer is this, don't screw it up, right? Because this is when food is at its very best. This is when we are going for the perfect bite. That we don't have to do anything too. The less you mess with summer food, the better it is gonna taste for you. And I stand by that with peaches. Now peaches are nutritional powerhouses. They are loaded with vitamins. They are so, so good for you. Don't hesitate to eat a peach, but. Can you do something with them that's gonna make them part of a complete meal? Sure. Let's think about. Salad because that's your natural go-to, right? That is the natural first place to not screw it up too much if you're making a salad. And one of my favorites is when I take different stone fruits, so I'll take peaches ripe plums. Cherries and I'll pair them with something that's a little bitter. So I really like arugula because it is a crisp green that has a little bit of bitterness to counteract the sweet there. So if you go and you can look at. All of my social media. And scroll back, I have my favorite salad, which is simply a bed of arugula, juicy, ripe peaches, those Rainier cherries. And I found some here locally last week, which I was shocked by. And some plums.'cause we're in plums season two. I take that, I put it on the arugula. I love to do maybe a little pickled red onion with it or some minced shallot, something to balance all of those flavors. And of course, a ball of creamy, delicious burrata that I tear apart and spread over the salad. I keep it very simple. Good olive oil. Good vinegar, either a champagne vinegar or a balsamic. Works nicely as well. And then good flaky Malden salt. You know, we always come back to the Malden Salt. I could eat this salad. No joke every single day. It's so good, but how can you vary it? Well, peaches and tomatoes actually really like each other. They go very well together when you have a ripe juicy tomato. So you can do a peach bruschetta with ripe juicy tomatoes. And believe it or not, fresh basil. Oh, it's so good with peaches. It's so, so good. So don't be afraid to take a couple of peaches and chuck it in with that. But remember when you've got all of that sweet, you do have to balance it out. So think you've got the sweet. You want some bitter or you want some sour, like some tanginess or you want some saltiness and just like my mom would always put salt on her watermelon. You could, in a salad preparation, add a bit of that salt, right? It's gonna make it. Really nice and really accent the freshness of what you're working with. Now, sometimes folks wanna still cook and I have had many clients say to me, I do not like meat and fruit together. And I always think that's so sad because there are some fruits that go so well with different meats. And if you're talking peaches, I think you really have. Two options here, and that is chicken and of course pork. And I know you're like, what? But think pork and apples and all of that good stuff. Pork is a natural player for fruit. So what could you do? Could you slice and saute peaches with some onion? Ooh, hello. Maybe we're gonna take some chicken breasts that we're gonna cut lid out. That means we're gonna take that whole breast and we're gonna cut it in half horizontally. So you have two nice thin pieces. Now some people like to then go and pound that thinner. Nobody has time for that. So since I've cut it that way, I'll saute that. We could use a little olive oil, we could use a little butter, we could use a little of both. Saute that, pull it out. Then I'm gonna saute some onion. And I love the idea of red onion here. I think red onion works really well with the peaches, so I'm gonna slice that. Maybe into little thin slices and saute in that butter in that same pan, right? That's so key because any of those little chicken bits or the fond that's left in the pan, that's going to give you so much good flavor. Then we're gonna take those peaches and throw'em in, and your peaches. Have to go in at the last minute. Okay, the last five minutes maybe. But the longer they cook, of course, the more they're gonna break down. Now that's okay. If you want it like a peach sauce, a little longer cook on it, maybe 10 minutes is gonna cause those to break down. But if you want chunks or pieces, go ahead and throw it in the last couple of minutes of cooking Now. After I've got my onions in there. Right? How about some white wine? Ooh, yeah. Or, and this is where you could go with a slightly sweeter wine, but avoid the shard, right? Because shard has all those woodsy notes, right? Woodsy, oaky sort of things. And when you are de glazing with a shard, you're gonna intensify those flavors. When you're de glazing with any wine, you're going to intensify the flavor. So. With this. We want a lighter vibe. We don't need those oat casks. A metal cask, a steel cask is fine. So Sauvignon Blanc is gonna be delicious. Maybe a little bit of chicken broth there too, just to even it out. We let that simmer a bit. Slide the chicken back in. Slide those peaches in. And this is such a simple recipe. What if we threw in. Some fresh thyme instead of going with what we think like the basil or something like that. I love fresh thyme. Strip it off the stems. Give it a little mint. Oh my goodness. Salt pepper. There you go. Make sure you serve that with some kind of green faro. You know I love Pharaoh, some Pharaoh, some rice, some brown rice that you threw in the rice cooker. Easy breezy, lemon squeezy. That is gonna make such a delicious sauce. Oh my goodness. So good. And you could do the same thing if you wanted, you could grill a pork tenderloin. In fact, maybe I'll do this today. You can grill a pork tenderloin and make the sauce separately. Or let's say, what if we did that pork tenderloin and we did it really simply, salt and pepper. A lot of people are shocked that you can just salt and pepper a nice piece of meat and if you cook it correctly, if you cook it well, it's gonna shine for you. But what if when we're doing this, we take our peaches. We cut'em in half. Hopefully you've got free stones. I have to tell you, I hate a cling stone peach. They make me crazy. And that's when the peach flesh clings to the seed inside. Oh my goodness. I hate it so much. I like when they just pop out nice and easy. I'm such a peach prima donna. But let's take those peaches, cut'em in half, leave the skin on, and why don't we grill them? Right, everybody's tried grilled peaches. And let me tell you, dessert with a grilled peach, all you have to do blow your friends away. All you have to do is lightly oil, the cut side of the peach, because remember, any kind of fat is going to enhance your browning there. So just lightly, lightly, lightly, lightly, and then pop that sucker on the grill. I like a high heat because it's going to cook more quickly. Right. And really what I'm going for are just those grill marks. That's it. That's it. We're not trying to cook that peach the whole way. We don't need to worry about that. We just wanna get that flavor, that intensity from the grill. So. Pop those suckers on the grill. Get those grill marks, pull'em off. And then if you're feeling really fancy, you can put it in bowl if you like, but you could also take just a little tiny slice off the bottom so that it sets flat on your plate. All right, now big scoop of vanilla ice cream or some whipped cream. You are using whipped cream though, you better whip it yourself. Right? We're not using the can for this. And I love a can of whipped cream, but think of that. You can have it kind of dripping over the side, and I'll tell you, don't be afraid to garnish it with a light sprinkle of fresh thyme. Ah, what? Yeah. Or maybe a little bit of fresh basil. Ugh, so good. So keep it. Simple. When it comes to peaches, there's no need to get crazy about it. Enjoy their lusciousness, enjoy all of the vitamins they're bringing to you, all the good food. And if you just want to eat one over the sink with the juice rolling down to your elbow. Well, that's a pretty good call too. So as always, I am Chris Van Bloem from the Empty Nest Kitchen. I'm just absolutely thrilled to be with you this week and I'll see you in the kitchen.

Christine Van Bloem
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Ep 48: Small Bites: Zucchini Magic