The Smell of a Fresh Peach Cake warm from the oven brings with it Memories of Dad and Mom.

I was recently at the store looking for inspiration

for a dessert to take to a family dinner.

There was a display of fresh southern peaches and my dilemma was solved.

Fresh Southern Peaches

Fresh Peach Sour Cream Pound Cake

Fresh Peach Sour Cream Pound Cake

Ingredients:
3 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup butter, softened (2 sticks)
3 cups sugar
6 eggs
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup sour cream
2 cups diced fresh or canned peaches

Glaze:
1 cup confectioners’ sugar
2 Tbsp cream cheese, at room temperature
1 Tbsp milk
Preparation: Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Grease and flour a 10-inch fluted tube pan.

Cream the butter and sugar until fluffy.

Add the eggs one at a time beating well.

Fold the flour, baking soda, salt into the creamed mixture, alternately with the diced peaches and sour cream. Stir in the vanilla and the almond extract.

Bake for 65- 75 minutes until the cake is golden brown and will just release from the sides of the cake pan. Let cool for 10 minutes in the pan, then cool completely on a rack.

Glaze: once the cake is cool, cream the confectioner’s sugar with the cream cheese and milk and pour over the cake. Fresh peaches can go on top for decoration.

 

As the cake was baking and the aromatic smells began wafting through

the Lane Home Place kitchen, I was awash with a sweet memory of a

time long ago on a warm afternoon in August when my Dad who was

an Instrument Mechanic for TVA, after his retirement from the USAF,

brought home several bushels of fresh North Carolina peaches that he

had purchased from a local Carolinian farmer while he was checking and

working on some TVA towers in the mountain ranges of North Carolina.

There were many a time he would run into a deal while visiting projects 
throughout the valley and he would bring them home joyfully to Mom for her to prepare, can or freeze them. She was not a warm and fuzzy kind of person by nature but she was not afraid of hard work and was always glad to see his bounty. 

The evening he brought home the peaches, I had just arrived at their place in Clinton from my job in Oak Ridge, to pick up our son Chris, who our Mom watched for us two days a week. Our children were blessed to be able to spend as much time as they wanted at their Papa and Granny's house and it allowed them to have a life long loving relationship with their grandparents giving them a mutual love for one another... Back to the peaches...Dad came in with the peaches with a smile on his face, and a twinkle in his eye and said " Murl (my Mom's name was Muriel) but everyone always called her Murl, just like my Dad's name was Byron Trent, (but everyone called him B.T.), these peaches are overripe, but they were a good deal, they have to be done tonight or they will ruin." Murl's face was not happy at this news,  I am sure she was tired from entertaining a 4 year old all day as well as the fact that they always played Pinochle on Friday nights with our Great Aunt Mary and Uncle Bob. men against the women, and it was their week to host.

Dad looked at me and said "Sissy Boo," his pet name for me, will you stay and help us? We will be parboiling, peeling, and slicing up the peaches so we can get them into the freezer tonight?" Then with that sweet turn of his head, and a smile that could melt your heart, he said "they sure will taste good this winter when we all want a little taste of summertime"

Of course I stayed.  We boiled water, we parboiled, we peeled, we sliced, we scooped them into every kind of imaginable left over container and then we carried them down the stairs to the basement, out into the garage and placed them into the freezer. The house was a waft with the smell of sweet peaches, the kitchen floor was sticky with peach juice where we had missed the bucket when we were peeling the peaches, and at the end of the night our hands were water wrinkled and cutup from working those peaches up with a paring knife, but it was one of those times in my life that I am so grateful to have gotten to share time with my parents, it was fun to be a part of their banter, I can hear their voices, our dad teasing and our Mom's wry comments in return. So when I see or smell peaches over ripe for the eating my heart flutters and visions of that memory flickers like an old time movie reel, all jiggly with the voices cracking making me laugh because I was there, I was apart and Dad was right that winter when Mom thawed out those peaches and served them up they were  awash with the smell and taste of summertime.

 

 

P.S. A side note

After I made the cake it said to put it upside down on a bottle and let it cool, which I have done many times before. It also said you would know it was done enough if it slipped out of the pan. I only had a small bottle with a small neck so I turned it upside down and put it on that. I was talking to my baby brother Andy when I heard a whoosh and the cake had slid down the bottle and onto the counter. I grabbed a plate and managed to pull the bottle out with out tearing the cake up and put it on the plate, all while talking to my brother. I was laughing while I was telling him what was going on. The cake was still warm and I cut a slice and ate it and told him that Mom's favorite was cake right out of the oven no icing...needless to stay it was delicious and it had Mom written all over it.

I dedicate this story to our Mom, Muriel Rose Engle Johnson, always a Kentucky girl at heart. Celebrating a night of over ripe peaches, a husband who loved to aggravate the hound out of her, four kids who did not always give her the credit she deserved. We love you Mom and we miss all of the parts of you we just did not understand when we were younger. It is amazing what years of experience can reveal to you.