Difference Between Pie & Cobbler

A cobbler is a pie with one pastry crust and fresh fruit that is baked in a deep dish. It is one of many variations of the basic pie, one of America's most beloved desserts.

History of Pie

Pie was brought to North America by the Pilgrims and has become a staple of American cooking. Although the first pies were made with fruits, refrigeration has allowed us to make pies with cream, peanut butter, chocolate, caramel and ice cream.

Description of Pie

Pies are baked in a deep dish, usually with a flaky pastry crust. When making a fruit pie, the fruit is usually baked between two layers of crust, the top layer being anything from a fully covered pastry to a lattice to a sugary crumble.

Relatives of Pie

A number of other fruit desserts are related to pies, including tarts, pandowny, crisp, crunch and buckle. Cobbler is among these desserts, which usually feature fruit and some kind of pastry dough.

What Is Cobbler?

What distinguishes cobbler from pie, in part, is that it has only one crust. Cobblers can be cooked in a deep dish of any shape---from a circle to a rectangle to an oval---and usually the fruit is cooked in the bottom of the dish while the layer of dough is placed on top.

Cobbler Dough

Although traditionally pie dough was used in cobblers, biscuit dough has become more popular today. The dough can either be placed over the fruit in a flat, whole layer, or it can be cut into circles, squares, rectangles or wedges. Some cobbler, like peach cobbler, uses dough with a more cake-like consistency, which is dropped into the cobbler in spoonfuls.

References

• Irma S. Rombauer, Marion Rombauer, Ethan Becker; The Joy of Cooking; 1997

Resources

• Cobbler Recipes