What to do when fruits headed to the dark side...

We get a CSA vegetable box every two weeks. Sometimes I wish it came more, and sometimes I can't keep up with our produce. We love going to the farmers' market, but I don't trust myself to go consistently. So, the box comes with produce we must eat, and we eat a healthy diet of produce. Everyone wins.

A few days ago, I noticed I had let the fruit go a bit too long. I ate 3 nectarines, 1 peach and 2 large plums for dessert one night. I thought only protein was filling, but I didn't need to eat again for the entire next day. We still had two pears which were too far gone to eat raw but not completely rotten.

Here's what I did:

• preheated oven to 350 degrees.

...and with the fruit:

• I used an apple corer to slice the 2 mushy fruits into pieces, and
• mixed them in a bowl with some sugar (about 2 tps).
• Lemon juice, cinnamon, and/or vanilla extract can be nice to add -- I added a small dollop of molasses.
• Mix and pour into a serving-sized Pyrex bowl.

In the original mixing bowl (no washing needed), I:

• melted about 2 tbs of butter,
• mixed with about 1/4 cup of oatmeal and
• 2 tbs sugar.
• Cinnamon and/or vanilla can be nice to add .
• Mix them all together, add some flour until crumbly but not dry.
• Pat on top of the fruit.

Cook about 30-45 min with a cookie sheet underneath.

Enjoy with cream, yogurt or ice cream.

This incredibly flexible recipe can be done with almost any fruit (not melon, but you get the idea) and almost any grain and fat on top. Over the years, I've noticed that it's especially good when I add lemon juice, use very ripe fruit and butter, and cook it for a long time.