Nobody’s a kook for trying this delicious peach kuchen, a queen of coffeecakes

I’ve never known how to pronounce that crazy word kuchen, but I’ve always loved recipes that made this little coffeecake. So I found a recipe for Peach Kuchen to kick off my Peachathon this weekend. This year we are blessed with peaches beyond belief! Two peach trees in our garden already have been harvested, with three to go. Our fridge is so full of peaches, we have trouble inserting anything else. This past weekend I had to get to cooking so we could clear out some bowls of peaches and make room for the next batch to be picked. Glory, glory! Because all of our peach trees were destroyed in the flooding in 2007 and the new trees only now are into full production, we’ve been waiting for this day of abundance for a long time.

This Peach Kuchen (I finally looked this German word up in a pronunciation guide. It’s KOO-khen, with the sound kook emphasized, except I’m certainly no kook for making it.) was our Saturday morning breakfast (and then dessert throughout the weekend). It was wonderful and so simple and of course very easy on the eating plan when made with the fat-free sour cream and sugar substitute.

I found the recipe online furnished by 1st Traveler’s Choice Internet Cookbook (www.virtualcities.com). The site featured Peach Kuchen as a signature recipe from Abigail’s Bed and Breakfast Inn in Camden, ME, a way-up-there city to which we’d actually traveled when we lived on the East Coast some years back. I could just imagine B&B guests sitting down to this breakfast delight. The ample crust of flour, sugar, baking powder, and butter made a terrific base for the peaches-and-cream topping.

Nope, no kooks in kuchen. I patted myself on the back for being one smart cook. Another peach recipe down and many, many to go.

Peach Kuchen

2 cups flour

1 cup sugar (or sugar substitute)

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

3/4 cup butter

5 peaches, peeled and sliced

2 egg yolks (or 1/2 cup egg substitute)

1 cup sour cream (we used fat-free)

1 teaspoon cinnamon

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Sift flour, baking powder, salt, and 2 tablespoons of the sugar together. Work in butter until mixture crumbles. Pile into an ungreased square pan and pat even layer over bottom and halfway up the sides of the pan. Place peach slices over pastry; sprinkle mixture of cinnamon and remaining sugar over top. Bake for 12 minutes. Mix egg yolks with sour cream; pour over top of partially cooked kuchen. Place back in oven for 30 to 40 more minutes until top is bubbly. Serve warm with no-sugar-added vanilla ice cream. Serves 6-8.