Sonkers in Surry County of North Carolina is a dessert dating back to the 1800s, one that’s similar to a cobbler.
I thought I knew everything about Southern cooking, especially those unique dishes found nowhere else. Imagine my surprise to find sonkers in Surry County of North Carolina, a dessert dating back to the 1800s that’s similar to a cobbler.
But then, it's not.
The story has it that sonkers originated after harvest, with North Carolina residents mixing fruit that had lost its ripeness with sweet ingredients such as sugar or molasses, then mixing it with flour to make a sort-of pie.
No two sonkers are alike. Some feature a crunchy top, while others look akin to a pot pie. Some resemble fruit swimming in a sweet soup topped by ice cream with dough pieces mixed in while others more like a custard.
Those differences are why there is a Surry Sonker Trail throughout the county. There are seven stops on the trail, all offering different versions of the North Carolina dessert, and we tried to sample sonkers at each one. For instance, Miss Angel’s Heavenly Pies in Mount Airy creates hers with seasonal fruit in small rectangular containers, then drizzles this doughy goodness with a moonshine-kissed glaze. If you want to kick this up a notch, add her special moonshine ice cream on top.
The featured stops along the Sonker Trail are:
Rockford General Store in the village of Rockford;
Southern On Main in Elkin;
Old North State Winery in Mount Airy (which is haunted; read the ghost story on our Southern Haunts page);
Miss Angel’s Heavenly Pies in Mount Airy.
Twilight Farm Shoppe in Mount Airy.
Owner Amy Bryant at Twilight Farm Shoppe, which has shared a Mt. Airy Main Street store with Prudence McCabe Confections for many years, recently replaced the confectionary on the Surry Sonker Trail. Twilight specializes in baked goods, making it ideal for the trail when Prudence McCabe closed this summer upon the retirement of owner Sue Heckman. The entire space was then renovated into Hundley’s General Store and re-opened Aug. 31.
Bryant is excited to continue the legacy of fresh-baked sonker. She appreciates the history of this heritage dessert found only in Surry County and serves her own style adapted from a recipe passed down to her father-in-law by his great-grandmother.
“I use all fresh fruit, a lot of it from The Farm in Dobson and my husband and I grow blueberries as well,” Bryant said. “My recipe is a combination of flour, sugar and egg crumbled together and then I add melted butter on top before baking, so it sinks down into the fruit but also creates a nice crust on top.”
Bryant will flavor her sonker based on what’s in season, using a rotation of peach, blackberry, strawberry, blueberry, apple and pumpkin pecan. She’s even considering cranberry sonker for the wintertime. Each sonker is individually baked and served in a 4.5-inch diameter tin that’s easy to transport.
“We get a lot of tourists who usually have gone somewhere local for lunch and don’t necessarily want it right away, so I wanted to make it easy to take with them,” Bryant says.
Currently the top seller is pumpkin pecan, which will remain on the menu through fall, along with peach, blackberry and apple.
“For pumpkin pecan, I take the pumpkin puree, sweeten it with a little bit of maple syrup, and then add pecans. I use the same crumble topping as my other sonkers, but mix pecans and cinnamon in with it,” says Bryant. “It has been a big hit.”
Twilight Farm customers can also purchase artisan sourdough breads, cakes, cookies, brownies, cream horns and other baked goods. Bryant likes being a part of the general store, which has an old-fashioned theme that is a great fit for the Sonker Trail.
Want a Sonker Trail map? Call (800) 948-0949 or go online here.
Here are a few we sampled (heading down, Down Home Restaurant, Miss Angel's Heavenly Pies and Old North State Winery):
Weird, Wacky & Wild South is written by travel writer and sonker connoisseur Cheré Dastugue Coen.
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