I wrote last week about my Camp Serenbe cooking class full of eager young chefs who picked, chopped and whisked the week away with me. They were so incredibly precious with their cookie sheets and mise en place all ready to go.

After we did the tomato sauce and cheese soufflé on Monday and Tuesday, we spent Wednesday making a salad bar. They picked carrots in the garden at the Inn and created their own vinaigrettes with oils and vinegars.

The next day, it was time to talk dessert. The kids went into the Grange hamlet and picked blueberries for a blueberry cobbler from the bushes planted near the crosswalks. Then I asked how many of the kids had made their own whipped cream. We talked about the kind of whipped cream you can buy in a can—or, as I like to call it, That Which Shall Not Be Named—and I laid down my cardinal rule: If you can’t pronounce the words on it, don’t eat it.

So we made our own and wound up with so much of it that there was nothing else to do but go outside and have a whipped cream painting party. Some kids put it all over their entire face and bodies. Some just did a mustache. Some didn’t want it touching them at all. Some were throwing it at each other. But it was just one of those Auntie Mame moments—oh hell, let’s just do this. Sure, it would’ve been easier (and cleaner) to stay in the kitchen, but those kids left with big smiles—and freshly whipped cream—on their faces.

Blueberry Cobbler

• 1 cup sugar
• ½ cup butter
• 1 cup flour
• 1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
• ½ teaspoon kosher salt
• 1 cup milk
• 2 cups blueberries

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Slice butter and put it in a baking dish to cook in the oven until butter is melted. Mix together all the dry ingredients and then add milk. Pour batter into the melted butter then scatter fruit around. Bake for 30 minutes to 1 hour until middle is set.

Note: Several types of fruit can be used for this recipe. Sliced strawberries, blueberries or sliced peaches can be added raw. If using apples, peel, slice and cook in skillet with ¼ cup butter and 2 tablespoons brown sugar until soft.