Easy Cast Iron Skillet Cobbler and Crisp Recipes

It only made sense to make some cast iron skillet peach cobbler and peach crisp when our two peach trees produced a bumper crop of ripe, juicy fruit this year. Of course you can substitute any fruit you like for these recipes such as apple, cherry, blackberry or blueberry.

Cast Iron Skillet Peach Cobbler Recipe

This peach cobbler has a lightly sweetened biscuit topping made with your choice of yogurt, sour cream or buttermilk. The sweet, juicy peaches and light, fluffy biscuits with slightly crunchy sugared tops create the perfect bite of flavor and texture contrasts. Yum!

Peach cobbler sprinkled with sugar before it goes into the oven for a nice golden brown and crispy top.

Note! For each of these recipes, I am using a 10.25″ cast iron skillet. So if your skillet is larger or smaller, you’ll have to make some adjustments.

Ingredients:

Filling:

• 5-6 large peaches or desired fruit volume equivalent (more if you want it to be fruitier, just don’t fill your skillet more than 2/3 with fruit or it may overflow when cooking)
• 1/4 cup – 1/2 cup sugar (depending how sweet your peaches are)
• 1-2 tbsp of flour (depending on how juicy your peaches are). You can also use cornstarch, arrowroot, etc. Just adjust for thickening power equivalents.
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• pinch of salt
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon (optional)

Biscuit Topping:

• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 3 tbsp sugar plus 1 tsp (for sprinkling top of biscuits in skillet)
• 3/4 tsp salt
• 6 tbsp cold butter, cut into small ~1/4″ pieces
• 1/2 cup of sour cream, yogurt or buttermilk  (full fat products, not light or reduced fat)

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

1. Slice or dice the peaches with skin on or off, your choice. I just make things simple by leaving the skin on (vitamins & fiber bonus!) and I never notice them after they’ve been cooked.
2. Put the peaches in your skillet and add the sugar, flour, lemon juice and cinnamon. Mix to combine well. I do this instead of using a separate bowl. One less dish to wash, ya know.
3. Place the skillet with the peach filling in the oven for 10-15 minutes, until slightly thickened and bubbly.

While that’s cooking, prepare the topping…

1. Combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder, sugar and salt in a bowl or food processor.
2. Add the cold butter pieces to the flour mixture and incorporate with a pasty cutter or pulse your food processor until it resembles coarse meal.
3. Add the sour cream, yogurt OR buttermilk and stir just until dough is formed. Do not overwork the dough or you will get tough biscuits! If it seems a little dry and not holding together, just add a little more of your chosen wet ingredient. Too much moisture will make for a heavier biscuit.
4. Remove skillet from oven and drop 1/2 cup portions of dough onto peaches, leaving some space between each biscuit.
5. Sprinkle each biscuit with some sugar.
6. Return skillet to oven and bake until the biscuits are golden brown and fruit is bubbling, approximately 20-30 minutes.
7. Cool for at least 15 minutes before serving.

Cast Iron Skillet Peach Crisp Recipe

I don’t like soggy crisp because there’s no crisp in soggy. So I have found this ratio of flour, oats, nuts (optional) and butter is perfect for maintaining the crisp factor.

Ingredients:

Filling (similar to peach cobbler, except no need to cook the peaches before adding the topping):

• 5-6 large peaches or desired fruit volume equivalent (more if you want it to be fruitier, just don’t fill your skillet more than 2/3 with peaches or it may overflow when cooking)
• 1/4 cup – 1/2 cup sugar (depending how sweet your peaches are)
• 1-2 tablespoons of flour (depending on how juicy your peaches are). You can also use cornstarch, arrowroot, etc. Just adjust for thickening power equivalents.
• pinch of salt

Topping:

• 3/4 cup flour
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup oatmeal
• 1/2 cup nuts (optional)
• 1/4 lb cold butter (1 stick), diced into small pieces

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. I live at a high altitude (5,500 ft), so I actually bake mine at 375 degs F for 45 minutes, then turn it up to 400 deg. F for 10 more minutes or so until the top gets browned.
2. Slice or dice the peaches with skin on or off, your choice. I just make things simple by leaving the skin on (vitamins & fiber bonus!) and I never notice them after they’ve been cooked.
3. Put the peaches in your skillet and add the sugar and flour. Mix to combine well. Let sit while you make the crumb topping. If after 5 minutes or so of sitting there is still a lot of juice, add more flour.

Now make the topping…

1. Combine the flour, sugar, brown sugar oatmeal, nuts and butter in a food processor until the mixture is crumbly and butter pieces are pea-sized.
2. Spread the topping over your peaches in the skillet.
3. Bake 1 hour until the topping is brown and crisp and peach juices are thickened and bubbly. Again, you can turn you oven up a notch if it is not crispy enough in one hour. Just check every 5 minutes to make sure it doesn’t burn.
4. Serve and enjoy! Crisp is especially good topped with vanilla ice cream. We like it also with our homemade cheesecake ice cream. All done in moderation, of course. 😉

 Many Thanks To Our Peach Trees!

We planted one Hale Haven Peach Tree and one Red Haven Semi-Dwarf Peach tree when we first moved into our house and have had lots of peaches every year except for one. This year was especially plentiful.

So far we have frozen 20 quarts of sliced peaches, gave peaches to all our neighbors and we still have peaches ripening on the tree. We are like Bubba from Forrest Gump, but instead of shrimp, it is peaches….Peach preserves, peach soup, General Tso’s peach chicken, peach salsa, peach vinaigrette, peach cobbler, peach crisp, etc.. Try out our other quick and easy dessert recipes like Dutch Baby Pancakes and French Clafoutis.

Our Red Haven Semi Dwarf Peach Tree thriving in the cold Plant Hardiness Zone 4. So if you’re in a cold location, don’t rule out peach trees!