Being from the Deep South, I, as most good southern cooks, have very narrow definitions of what certain foods are. The following foods fall in this category: Jam/Jelly, Casserole/Bake, Stew/Soup and the list goes on. Seeing as how I married a good ol' New York Yankee boy, none of these foods are more contested than the Cobbler/Crumble. A line has been drawn in our family that is reminiscent of the Dixie and after 16 years of marriage, there is no way I'm budging on this one. The following is a recipe that I have perfected for a fruit cobbler. It is not in any way, shape or form, to be confused with a crumble - other than the fact that they are both baked, in an oven, in casserole dishes.
The fruit cobbler is a dish of necessity. Back when refrigeration was not the norm, either you ate it or canned it. The fruit that was going to waste that could not make it through the canning process because it would spoil first was thrown into a pan and baked either in a pie or in a less uppity, cobbler. There is no one way to make it, it is "cobbled" together by what is on hand, but below is an outline on where to start.
A True Southern Girl's Fruit Cobbler (PRINTABLE RECIPE)
