Colorado. Peaches, not "oysters."

Colorado, meaning red-colored. It’s one of several states the Rocky Mountains runs through, and just so happens to be one of the states my family drove through on our way to Arches National Park in Utah for a family vacation this summer. While in Colorado we went to a science museum, which if you don’t know me I loved, and the 16 street mall which was sweet.

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It ain't good if it ain't green.

So what’s cooking this week? We considered two Colorado classics but we didn’t think we could get our hands on the ingredients: green chili and rocky mountain oysters. While on our trip to Colorado, we made a point to keep our eyes out for them. And guess what? The restaurant we stopped at for lunch just so happened to serve both.

I was really excited to try the green chili which didn’t disappoint. That, and the chili was, in fact, green.

The rocky mountain oysters, however, I was reluctant to try. They’re not exactly the first part of the bull that I’d like to eat… But either way, my Grandpa DeGrote thought it was funny and ordered a plate of them anyway. He sweetened the deal by offering 10 dollars to anyone that would eat them. My brother was really enjoying them, most likely because he didn’t know what he was eating until after his second or third one.

It took some convincing from my Grandma DeGrote, but I reluctantly agreed to eat one of the rocky mountian oysters. With little flavor, it felt a bit like chewing on a rubber ball. My mom said they tasted like country-fried steak. Personally, I wouldn’t recommend them, but my brother would tell you otherwise.

Next up on our vacation: up and over the Rocky Mountains. As we continued west on our roadtrip, it was really cool to see how the landscape changed and created the perfect environment to grow peach trees in Palisade, Colorado. Which brings me to what we made for our State on My Plate meal this time around. We had several different choices, such as prime rib, trout, or MORE rocky mountain oysters but we ultimately chose peach cobbler. Just because I didn’t want to eat rocky mountain oysters again.

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Millions of peaches. Peaches for me.

In comparison to some of the other States on My Plate meals, this was a relatively easy meal. We started the peach cobbler with, well, peaches. Since I’ve never cut peaches before, I didn’t exactly know how to attack them so proceeded in the way I deemed easiest: holding them in the air and slicing the skin off with a knife. Though apparently, this was the wrong way to go about cutting them. Mom told me I was supposed to cut them on the plate, which turned out to be much easier than holding them in the air.

After the peaches were chopped, we got started on the topping. One of the ingredients, nutmeg, decided it want to leap out of the container and into my bowl, which I then had to scoop out of the flour until I had about the right amount. The mixture of flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, and butter came together into a kind of nice, crumbly topping I would expect from a peach cobbler.

I was ready to assemble. First, I spooned the peaches into a 9 by 9 pan. Then I crumbled the topping onto the peaches, which felt a bit like wet sand. Once I had topped the peaches with the “desired amount of topping” (to quote the recipe), there was a bit of leftover topping. And what do you do with any sugary, leftover topping? You eat it. So that’s what I did. Once the cobbler was done and the excess crumble was eaten, I put the cobbler into the oven, where I left it for the next half hour.

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You could see the smell lines. It smelled that good.

When it came out of the oven, I felt like a cartoon character floating through the air towards the delicious scent of baked Colorado peaches. We served it up along with some vanilla bean ice cream (but not classic vanilla). as requested by Mom, and dug in. It was excellent, and the nutmeg really complemented the peaches. Which either means I used to much, or eye balled the amount well. It was an easy but delicious dessert, and I’m looking forward to the next time we make it.

Make it for yourself with this recipe: https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/colorado-peach-cobbler/