Y’all, even I’m impressed at how well this small batch recipe for plum cobblers with cream cheese biscuits turned out. Not only is the fruit filling jammy AF (cue the Space Jam theme song), the layers of cream cheese make these biscuits next level. I’m obsessed!!!!

With the start of May, I have a few quarantine goals:

Develop a bomb ass skincare routine
Take advantage of as much spring produce as I can
Challenge myself with food

New and improved skincare routine is well on its way, thanks to the Sephora sale (more on that at the bottom of this post), so it’s onward to berries and plums and all the newness that spring brings.

I’ve been writing some complicated, multi-day recipes that I want to make at some point (looking at you, caneles), but with work, exercise, regular meal cooking, and hosting virtual pastry classes, (have you signed up yet?), I sometimes want something that I don’t need to overthink and tastes like spring.

These biscuits will make you sit the F down and think about what you did to deserve such luxury. They start with a shaggy dough that you make with your hands, followed by adding cream cheese slices and stacking everything to create the thinnest, crispest layers that hold their shape when smothered in ice cream and melt in your mouth when you scoop out a piece.

Another trick to get the jammiest texture with your fruit—add a bit of jam! Jam adds body to your fruit and helps emulsify the leftover juice from the stovetop cooking. That juice then becomes your ice cream topping—zero waste!

Don’t skip out on brushing the biscuits before baking. I used duck fat because I am a monster, but you can just use butter—unless you have duck fat, then 1000% use that. It caramelizes the tops of the biscuits for a picture perfect dessert before pure annihilation.

Hope you enjoy these small batch plum cobblers!

Small Batch Strawberry-Plum Cobblers for Two with Cream Cheese Biscuits

Created by Shikha on May 5, 2020

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Prep Time:45m
Cook Time:30m
Total Time:1h 15m

Serves: 12
Yield: 2 ramekins

Ingredients

For biscuits:

180 grams (1.5 cups) all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 stick cold unsalted butter, cut into cubes
1/2 cup whole milk, heavy cream, or buttermilk
2 ounces cream cheese, cold, cut into slices

For filling:

1 plum, diced
3 medium-sized strawberries, hulled and diced
1/4 teaspoon cardamom
1/8 teaspoon allspice
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
1 tablespoon mixed berry jam

For topping:

Duck fat, or butter, melted
Turbinado sugar, or regular sugar

Instructions

For biscuits:

In a medium mixing bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, and salt. Add in butter cubes and smush the cubes in with the flour using your fingers. Keep doing this until the dough looks shaggy and there are still big chunks of butter. You'll have dry bits of flour at the bottom of the bowl.
Add in the milk, and use your hands to fold the dough onto itself until it forms a loose ball. It will still look dry and not put together completely.
Turn the dough out onto a clean surface and pat into 1-inch thick square. Cut the dough into 4 pieces. Add 1 slice of cream cheese to 3 of the squares, gently pressing to flatten. Stack the cream cheese topped pieces on top of each other. Add the final piece (with no cream cheese) on top of the stack to form one giant stack, and press down to flatten.
Dust the surface with flour and roll the dough into a 1 inch thick circle. Use a biscuit cutter that fits the diameter of your ramekins, and punch out 4-6 biscuits, rerolling out the dough as needed (you can also cut circles freehand).
Transfer biscuits to a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and refrigerate for at least 20 minutes before using.

For filling:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Combine all filling ingredients in a small saucepan and set over medium heat. Cook for 8-10 minutes, until fruit is soft and bubbling. Strain out the fruit from the juice and set juice aside for now. You'll use it later.
Set two standard-sized ramekins on a baking sheet. Divide the fruit mixture between the two ramekins. Remove two biscuits from the fridge and set on top of the fruit.
Brush the tops of the biscuits with duck fat (or butter, if you don't have duck fat casually lying around like I do), and top with turbinado sugar.
Bake for 25-30 minutes until the biscuits are a deep golden color and the fruit is bubbling. Let cool for 5 minutes, then carefully plate ramekins on a plate. Top with ice cream and the leftover juice.