The Peach Misadventure

Having quite a few peaches ripening in a bowl on the counter, I was open to making them into a dessert. I scourged the net for a recipe. I found all kinds of tarts, pies, crisps, cobblers and such. Watching the new Cooking Channel's French Food At Home, I came across something I thought I could adapt. It was the recipe for Easy Pastry Shop Apple Tart. Don't ask how I got to a crustless Peach Ricotta Pie from there but one must give credit where it is due.









Now the original recipe called for things like butter, sugar, cream cheese and flour. These are things that I do not customarily consume for dessert. So I tinkered with it a little...and then a lot.

The first mishap was the crust. I tried replacing the flour with almond flour. The crust was a bubbly buttery goop. So I scraped in back into the bowl and added some flour. Next, I pressed it into a tart pan and baked again. It was a little to brown to weather another 40 min in the oven, so I put it down the sink.

Since I had made the "cream" filling, I decided to go crustless! Having switched out the cream cheese for blended ricotta (lower calories, more protein), I confidently poured my filling into a pie plate and added my peach mixture.

Did I mention I took the 1 and 1/3 cups of sugar and reduced it down to 6 tablespoons of xylitol?

The smell of peaches, vanilla and dairy gave me a sense of delight when I pulled out my improved concoction out of the oven. I let it cool...it was when slicing for servings that I knew my gig was up. A bit of liquid had separated into the bottom and the cheese and peaches did not hold together, pie-like. Frankly, it looked like I added peaches to scrambled eggs. Ordinarily, I might hide it under a heaping serving of whipped cream but we don't eat that either...and I'm currently out of a white frozen dessert made with coconut milk and agave nectar.

So I got busy in the kitchen because I saw this:









I would have been happy with something like this:











As you can see, things looked promising going in:








And, coming out:









Here's when I knew I was defeated:








So after wasted hours and wasted products (that almond flour and organic butter ain't cheap), I will serve my dessert because I have a sweetheart husband that eats anything I give him. However, I will use a trick from those French claufouti cooks...douse it in Amaretto.