Dewberry cobbler is your reward
Picking dewberries is a wonderful warm-day pastime. When I was young, my friends and I would march out to the wilder parts of my suburban Houston neighborhood—such as the bayou, vacant lots or the rough patch next to the golf course—and brave water moccasins, thorns and poison ivy to score some of these black orbs, warm from the sun and ready to pop in your mouth.
Usually, we’d eat them straight from the bush, smearing our t-shirts and shorts with the dark, sticky juice. But sometimes we’d be more organized and bring a container so we could pick them and then take them home to our parents so they could make dewberry cobbler for dessert.
Spending plenty of time on a farm, I know that when you venture into a bramble you need to wear strong boots filled with sulfur to keep those chiggers at bay. But what was cool at the farm was not cool in Houston, and so we’d usually be wearing at best tennis shoes and at worst flip flops as we made our way through the berry patch. Needless to say, you can get scuffed up something ugly after a bout of picking dewberries if you’re not properly clothed. But no matter—the joy of finding food in the wild mitigated any cosmetic damage done to our legs.
Between my mom’s organic garden in the backyard and my family’s farms, I had plenty of experience with food coming out of the ground. But there was something special about dewberries. Perhaps it was because we suffered greatly to get to them. Or perhaps it was because there were never any grown-ups involved in our foraging adventures. Or perhaps it was just because this wild food tasted so darn good.
Some argue that blackberries and dewberries are one and the same. I don’t know the answer to this. And sadly, I haven’t seen dewberries growing in any New York City vacant lots or in Central Park (though if there are dewberries here, please let me know!) so I can’t do an immediate taste comparison. But we do have blackberries and they are a decent substitute for dewberries.
I like to make a cobbler with my berries, though they could also be made into jam, juice or tarts. What do you make with yours?
And don’t get me wrong—a blackberry cobbler is nothing to sniff at. But I know that it would taste even better if I had made it with berries I had picked myself, berries still glistening with the morning’s mist that gives the berry its proper name—dewberry.
Dewberry cobbler
Ingredients
Filling ingredients:
- 4 cups dewberries or blackberries
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 2 tablespoons cornstarch
- 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon lemon juice
Crust ingredients:
- 1/2 stick of butter
- 1 cup of flour
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 cup of buttermilk
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350° F.
- Place the rinsed berries in a large cast-iron skillet or 9-inch round cake pan, and toss the berries with the sugar, cornstarch, cinnamon and lemon juice. Let them macerate for 20 minutes.
- To make the crust, melt the butter on low in a pan, and then stir in the flour, sugar, baking powder, buttermilk, and salt. The dough will be slightly sticky, moist yet pliable.
- Pat out the dough and place it over the berries.
- Bake 40 minutes or until light brown and bubbling.
I grew up in a little bitty town in Brazoria County and remember picking deweberries out in our pasture. Then I grew up, moved to the city (Austin and San Anto), and never heard "deweberry" again. I've spent my adulthood thinking "dewberry" was a figment of my childhood imagination. Thanks for the validation. P.S. Made your Texas sheet cake last night for book club –easiest cake to make ever, and it looks super delish!
I grew up in North Houston on the edge of the city limits… the boundary became the bayou behind our house… I was introduced to dewberrries by a grandmother, she picked in Luling…. so I recognized the treats when I saw them… berry picking was an adventure, I am outside of Houston and have my eyes peeled as I drive thru the rice fields lines… searching for those beautiful berries… this year they came up in my flowerbed surrounding the tree and I didnt cut them! I have a few green berries and am impatiently waiting as a dewberry cobbler is most certainly in my future!
I actually found this blog while searching for a dewberry cobbler recipe. As a young girl, I grew up in DeWitt County, and my mom would send me and my older brothers to pick dewberries. She would give us buckets and big bowls and told us to come back only when they were full. She would make cobblers, pies and fritters(turnovers). Then we moved to San Patricio County(coastal bend) and then on to Refugio county, always missing dewberries. After living in Beeville, Austin, and now Houston, they have completely eluded me. This brings me to why I'm writing. Today, while on a break at work, something caught my eye in the brush…. could it be??? YES! Dewberries!!!!! A giant patch of dewberries right there behind our office building off of Beltway 8. I picked about 4 cups after work, and there will be so many more ripe next week! I'm going to make a cobbler tonight, and hopefully once a week for the rest of my life!!! I am so excited!!! I have to thank you so much for your blog, it brought back so many wonderful memories! Now it's time to bake!!!
Yum, yum! This is my second go round of your wonderful cobbler. After 18 years in Texas I have finally discovered the wonders of dewberries, which grow in our park here in Cinco Ranch, Katy. I grew up in Pennsylvania with mammoth blackberry bushes, so I guess I kind of thought of the dewberries as mini-mutant blackberries and never gave them much thought. My mistake!!!
So I found your recipe when trying to figure out what to do with these things and made your cobbler last week (the deliciousness oozed all over the bottom of my oven!). I do have a question or maybe a comment about the recipe. You note that the dough should be sticky and pliable and we should press it onto the dewberries. I found that the dough was pretty thin – to the point where I poured it on the berries. I followed the recipe both times to the tee, with the sole exception of using powdered buttermilk instead of real stuff. Could that make the difference, do you think? Or perhaps the quantities are off a small bit. I'm curious.
And while you miss your dewberries, I miss my WaWa hoagies You'll have to go to PA or NJ to get one, but it's worth it, so have one for me!
Kristen–I just made a batch and it was sticky and soft, and not a pourable batter. Not sure why yours is different but if it tastes good I reckon it's OK!