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Nothing is better after dinner on a late summer evening than enjoying a bowlful of warm homemade southern peach cobbler with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. This is one of the best peach cobbler recipes you'll ever find. Made simply and easily using canned peaches and a delicious golden brown crust, it's the perfect soul food comfort food ending to any meal.
This is a true old fashioned, deep south, soul food peach cobbler recipe, honey. The black folks' southern peach cobbler recipe, the one that shows up every Sunday after service at the Southern Baptist church with the big ole bucket of off-brand vanilla ice cream.
Who else but the Southern Belle of the food blogging world could bring you a southern peach cobbler so good it makes sanctified church folk cuss (on accident of course!) and praise the Lord in the same breath?
I spent many a summer at my Grandma Reid's house in Georgia, picking fresh peaches off the trees in her gardens, biting into the biggest and juiciest one I could find and having sticky peach juice run down my arms, then watching her can all the excess, and enjoying those sweet peaches in her old fashioned peach cobbler when we came back for Thanksgiving.
While mama's is more like juicy peaches and dumplings (delicious!), grandma's was more like peach pie cobbler with a tasty golden brown crust, rather than the fluffy drop biscuits like I have both here and in my Southern Bourbon Peach Cobbler.
This is my family's favorite dessert for me to make in the late summer, and I love making it for them. Not only because it brings me back to my days as a little girl where my mama would make peach cobbler, signaling it was about to be back to school season, and my grandma's Thanksgiving feasts.
In other words, this easy peach cobbler recipe is the best of both worlds: those warm late summer nights with the kids catching fireflies, and the transition into autumn with warm spices and comforting baked goods.
Jump to:
- Origins of Black Folks Peach Cobbler
- The Difference between a Cobbler and a Crisp
- The Best Peaches for Cobbler
- The Best Way to Remove the Skins off of Peaches
- Ingredients.
- How to Make this Easy Southern Peach Cobbler Recipe
- Storage Instructions
- Frequently Asked Questions
- Try more Southern Recipes:
- Southern Peach Cobbler with Canned Peaches
Origins of Black Folks Peach Cobbler
Fruit cobblers aren't truly a southern dessert, but peach cobbler 100% is.
Fruit cobblers came from English colonizers; they had wild tales about how raw fruits were poisonous, therefore the only way to eat fruit was to have them cooked down a ton. A few years after they migrated to the northeast U.S., many of those who were rich enough to have access to flour or sugar, didn't have the skills or tools to cook pies using traditional methods.
They threw in dough, often leftover biscuit dough from the morning, and baked the fruit. The baked dough took on a 'cobbled' appearance and that is one of the major theories on why it's called cobbler.
Now, what does this have to do with African American history? Because, especially in the South, those rich enough to have access to flour and sugar were also the ones who purchased and trafficked kidnapped Black people.
And they were the ones making peach cobblers, since peaches were only able to be grown in the deep South where it was warm enough to farm them, and passing those recipes onto their children and to other enslaved people, and cooking those foods in the houses of their enslavers and then their employers after the Civil War.
After the Civil War, once the price of flour and sugar became affordable and enslaved Black people were freed, Black folks carried on their soulful peach cobbler recipes and created traditions with many foods we consider soul food, and peach cobbler is definitely one of them.
The Difference between a Cobbler and a Crisp
Cobblers are denser due to the biscuit dough topping, while crisps use an oat-and-streusel topping. You can see the difference in my peach crisp recipe.
And to be a cobbler it actually needs that biscuit topping. With a batter-like topping it's actually called a buckle.
The Best Peaches for Cobbler
If you're using fresh peaches, or are canning some to use for a later time, the kind of peaches you want are yellow freestone peaches. And if they're from the South, specifically Georgia and South Carolina, you've got the best peaches to cook with.
Freestones are the ones who aren't attached by the strength of God to their pits and the flesh will easily twist and pop away.
At the store, look for large peaches that are firm and give off a sweet, peachy smell. Ripe peaches are very fragrant. Make sure they're bruise-free, bruises are a purple-ish brown with somewhat wrinkled skin from the flesh decomposing.
The Best Way to Remove the Skins off of Peaches
Peaches are much like tomatoes when it comes to peeling them. Their flesh is really delicate and can bruise easily. So to remove their skin, whether it's for canning or for cobbler, here's the easiest way to do it:
First, get a large pot. One that'll hold the peaches and water comfortably. Fill it with water and bring it to a boil.
Once at a boil, reduce the heat to a lively simmer and gently add the peaches, we're blanching them! They won't be in there for longer than about 30-45 seconds, so don't go anywhere.
Get a large bowl of ice water and use a spider spoon to scoop the peaches from the hot water. Shock them in the ice water to stop their cooking.
Use a knife to gently peel the skin away once the peaches have cooled down.
Ingredients.
Peach Cobbler Filling
Canned sliced peaches. Use the ones packed in fruit juice and drain them well before mixing them with the other ingredients.
Brown sugar. This is a black folks peach cobbler, it's gotta have brown sugar!
Ground cinnamon, cloves, ginger. My favorite spices to use in peach cobbler, trust me they are what separates the meh cobblers from the ones that make your church friends accidentally cuss because they're so good.
Vanilla extract.
Lemon juice and zest. Lemon zest is what holds the actual 'lemon' flavor.
Corn starch. This makes the filling thicken up and get good and syrupy, no loose watery peach cobbler here!
Southern Peach Cobbler Biscuit Topping
All Purpose Flour.
Granulated Sugar.
Baking powder. Use fresh aluminum-free baking powder so you don't end up with metallic cobbler. Also, the older your baking powder, the more likely it is to lose its strength and not work. Replace your baking powder every 6 months!
Kosher Salt.
Cinnamon.
Cold unsalted butter.
Boiling Water. It activates the gluten in the flour and reacts with the sugar to make a crackly crispy crust that is so delicious and a perfect contrast to all that sweet, syrupy peachy filling.
Cinnamon Sugar. This gives the top of the cobbler a delicious crunch and beautiful sparkly finish thanks to the turbinado sugar.
How to Make this Easy Southern Peach Cobbler Recipe
My secret for a great cobbler is baking it in a cast iron skillet. Old school, y'all! The skillet holds heat better than a baking dish so your cobbler topping is well-baked and makes a beautiful, rustic presentation.
Making peach cobbler filling with canned peaches
This peach filling is extremely easy to make. You could even just mix it up in the skillet!
Drain all the canned peaches well, then mix all of the ingredients together. That's it! So simple. That corn starch thickens the syrup that's created while the peach mixture macerates in all those spices and sugar.
Making the cobbler topping
Again, simple to make: whisk together all the dry ingredients, then use a pastry blender to cut the butter into the flour mixture.
Now here's the weird part: boiling hot water. Mix it in quickly, and once the dough all comes together use a cookie scoop to dollop drop biscuits over all that delicious peach mixture in the cast iron pan.
Then bake and that's it! So simple, yet absolutely irresistible and perfect for the holidays since it's easy to whip up and make ahead the day before!
Storage Instructions
Keep the peach cobbler in an airtight container or wrapped well in its baking dish. Store in the fridge for up to 4 days!
Frequently Asked Questions
White peaches are sweeter, with a more delicate flesh than its yellow peach counterpart. I find it better for eating fresh or putting into peach bellinis than baking since their flesh doesn't hold up as well.
Yes it does! Peach cobbler should stay in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 4 days.
Cornstarch will always keep your cobbler nice and thick, so don't forget it in the peach mixture!
My preferred method is freezing before baking, since the baked cobbler's topping can get a little soggy.
Prep the entire cobbler and put it in a freezer-safe baking dish, wrap it just like the baked cobbler instructions, and freeze it for up to three months.
To bake the frozen cobbler, bake it for about 20 minutes longer than the original recipe.
Try more Southern Recipes:
- Soul Food Southern Baked Mac and Cheese (my #1 soul food recipe with over 2,000 rave reviews!)
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Southern Peach Cobbler with Canned Peaches
Ingredients
PEACH COBBLER FILLING
- 3 15 oz cans peaches in light syrup, drained
- ½ cup light brown sugar
- 1 heaping teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon ground ginger
- ¼ teaspoon ground clove
- Zest of 1 lemon, finely grated
- Juice of ½ a lemon
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
BISCUIT TOPPING
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
- 6 tablespoon unsalted butter, cold and cubed
- ¼ cup boiling hot water
Cinnamon Sugar Topping
- 2 tablespoon turbinado sugar
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
Instructions
- Make the Peach Cobbler Filling
- Preheat your oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C/200 degrees C in a fan-forced oven).
- In a large mixing bowl, stir together sliced peaches, brown sugar, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, lemon zest, lemon juice, vanilla extract, and cornstarch. Let sit for 5 minutes to macerate as you make the topping.
- Make the Cobbler Biscuit Topping
- In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the all-purpose flour, brown sugar, baking powder, and kosher salt. Use a pastry cutter to cut the butter into the dry ingredients, until the butter is cut into pea-sized pieces and the mixture looks like coarse meal.
- Mix in boiling hot water until all ingredients are just combined with a baking spatula.
- Add the macerated peaches and their juices into a 9 or 10 inch cast iron skillet. Drop spoonfuls of the topping over the peaches using a cookie scoop or two spoons.
- Bake
- Mix together the cinnamon and sugar in a small bowl and generously sprinkle the cinnamon sugar mixture over the peach cobbler topping.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 30-35 minutes, or until the peach cobbler is browned and bubbly.
- Remove the peach cobbler from the oven and let cool for 15 minutes before serving. Serve warm, topped with vanilla ice cream.
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