I don’t like baking. I don’t like cake. And I really don’t like turning on my oven in the summer. Why then, did I recently find myself making this peach cake twice in the same week? Let me tell you why. It is freaking delicious.
Every summer since I discovered my favorite farmer and his one-man market, I have gone a little peach crazy. Each week beginning in mid-July, he sets aside a box of bruised, super-ripe or otherwise slightly inferior peaches, which I then purchase at a deep discount, typically about 80 cents a pound. I usually buy 10-15 pounds at a time. People ask me what I do with all these peaches—can them or freeze them or something? But here’s my guilty little secret: I really just eat them all, with substantial help from my husband and son.
Somehow, though, a few weeks ago, I ended up with a bowl of cut-up peaches in the fridge that were a little ripe to eat raw, even for me. So, I got it in my head that I would use them to make a peach cake. I even went so far as to purchase a little bottle of buttermilk so that I could follow the recipe, which I have now slightly adapted from Lisi’s Luscious Desserts. Company was coming, so I figured that I better do this up right. And it. Was. Good. So good, in fact, that a few days later, with my new crate of peaches on hand, I made another one for an Olympic-themed party. Apple pie may be the quintessential American dessert, but the peak of apple season is still a month away, so peach cake was it. And let me tell you, there was no complaining about my substitution.
