Blueberries Are Okay.

I'm not one much for blueberries. I'm not one much for berries in general. Maybe it's the taste, maybe it's the texture, or the lack of juiciness. But really I think it's the fact that I have to eat 25 of them to get one serving of fruit. So what would ever make me want to bike to the orchard to pick these tiny fruits myself? The answer is Solebury Orchard's Apple Cider Ice. Imagine the most delicious apple cider you've ever tasted made into a slushie on a hot day. You'd be picking blueberries too.

So anyway, I have to admit that the fresh blueberries weren't all that bad, and they were exceptionally gorgeous. Again, the experience of seeing your fruit on a tree and then eating that fruit is about one-zillion times better than freezing your cutuckus off in the frozen food isle of a supermarket. I know I rant all the time about this, and eventually I will stop, but the more I visit supermarkets, the more I get really creeped out. You step into this giant refrigerator, and are greeted with perky flowers and a starbucks kiosk. Then you peruse isle after isle of food... from all over the world! The bright mounds of produce gleam like still life photos from the MOMA, and there's a looping thunderstorm in the leafy greens shelf.

I mean, I still buy the occasional avocado from Acme. But I came from work to find this fatty green treasure, whereas it came from CALIFORNIA. (And we grumble about the person who saunters in front of our car as we're hunting for parking spots!)

Anyway... blueberries, blueberries. Look how precious and perfect they are right off the branch!

Picking them was a pretty good time. Although I will say I felt strangely like a primate as I squatted and plucked ripe nerdles of fruit off a branch with my thumb and forefinger.

The next day, my berry pickin partner and I made some pretty dank blueberry crepes. Although I completely misunderstood how a crepe-maker is supposed to be used, they still turned out pretty well. Check it out:

CREPE BATTER:

3/4 cup all purpose flour

1/2 tsp salt

1 egg and 1 egg yolk

2/3 cup milk mixed with 2/3 cup water

3 tbs unsalted butter melted and cooled

BLUEBERRY FILLING:

three or four handfuls of fresh blueberries

4 Tbs of water

2 Tbs of packed brown sugar

1 Tbs of honey

Hand squeezed juice of half a small lemon

• Put all the blueberry filling stuff into a small saucepan and bring to a boil
• Turn down the heat and stir a few times
• Let this simmer until the blueberries break apart and turn into mush
• Stir occasionally as this happens to ensure it doesn't burn
• Let the water burn off the mixture and heat until it thickens slightly
• Keep warm until ready

For the CREPES:

• Throw the flour, salt, eggs, milk/water mix, and butter into a mixer or food processor
• Blend until smooth (pretty awesomely simple huh. I think you could do this with a hnad mixer on high if you don't have either of the other gadgets.)

Putting it together. There are a few different ways I've actually cooked crepes. I have used just a pan, and I have used a crepe maker. A crepe maker is easier, of course.

PAN:

• Pan on medium heat
• Brush with butter
• Pour a thin layer of batter into pan. You might not be able to pour only from the middle, you will probably have to pour in a spiral to get a large, thin, layer
• Cook until the top gets shiny and bubbles harden
• Slide out of pan onto plate

CREPE MAKER (the right way):

• Pour batter into provided dish
• Heat griddle until light goes off
• Invert the griddle into crepe batter dish to 'dunk' the face of the griddle in the batter
• Hold for a second
• Flip over and cook till the light goes out
• Remove with a rubber spatula when the crepe appears shiny by inverting over a dish

Crepes are great just with a little powdered sugar, with fruit, and cheese but IMO are best with all three. I'm not going to lie, I got impatient to eat and didn't bother to sift my confectioners' sugar. So unrefined, I know. I melted a little chocolate and drizzled it ontop as well. Lastly I experimented with white cheddar cheese in the blueberry filling and I've got to admit it was my favorite combination.

Peach Granita

What is granita? It's an Italian dessert and it's wonderful and that pretty much sums it up. If you must know the details, it's like sorbet, except made with only very fresh ingredients and without any ice cream maker machine. (This is one thing that frustrates me about summer desert... you can only read ice cream and sorbet recipes if you're in the 'I own a really expensive ice cream machine' club. Which I'm not in, which is why I love granita.)

Being that it's early summer, there's an abundance of fresh fruit around. One thing I've come to really appreciate is seasonal eating. Supermarkets have made it seem like all varieties of fruit grow at all times in convenient locations. Like magic, there are strawberries in January, apples in April, and bananas all year round. It sickens me a little, actually. The problem with eating produce out of season is that you loose so much flavor and nutrition, and you probably pay out the waahoo for it. "Sure, I'll buy this styrofoam strawberry in December, because well, it's here!"

The other great thing about eating seasonally is that after going much of the winter without these exotic fruits, the spring and summertime harvest are that much more exciting. The first bite of a ripe peach is like ...... I don't know what. I could get dangerously cheese here, so I'll refrain.

So here it is, a seasonal dessert that I absolutely love. Peach granita. It's really simple, and beats Rita's waterice and bomb pops any day. (Remember bomb pops? Side note: every time I see an ice cream truck drive by, I WANT to want the ice cream truck but now just can't get past how creepy the whole deal is...)

All you need is:

• 2.5 cups chopped peaches (about 4-5 peaches) Please use regional peaches that are ripe, and are NOT the 'white peaches'
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 2 tsp lemon juice
• 1 cup water
• a pinch of salt
• 1/2 tsp vanilla (or more if you want a a heavier vanilla taste)

In this desert, your final product is a direct reflection of your ingredients. So use good ones!

• In a food processor or blender, process all the ingredients till the mixture is pretty smooth
• Pour into a clean glass dish. It should be fairly big and flat so your mixture will freeze quickly
• Rake the outside edges to the middle every 20-30 minutes until the whole thing is frozen and 'granulated'
• Serve immediately plain or with fresh whipped cream and honey
• If you want to save it, just cover it, and give it a chance to soften up a little before serving again

You can make this with many different fruits. I've made a pretty awesome mango granita, and I think I'll try peach blueberry granita soon.

Note: I have been taking all my pictures with a google phone, which used to take surprisingly good pictures for a phone. Now with the updated software, the camera function has regressed, and my pictures look way worse. One of those instances where change does not always mean progress. This is a rant for another time.

Grumpy Granola

It's 8:25am and I'm disgruntled. My nose is stuffed, my legs are achy, my head kinda hurts, I'm thirsty, and the rooster woke me up at 7am... along with the dumpster trucks that roar back and forth to the nearby quarry. Ugh.

It sounds like a hangover. But the sad part is that it's not.

The crisp morning air wasn't enough to snuff out my melodramatic woes. So I'm making granola. As I sit the air is filling with a sweet almond scent of golden goodness. ugh.

I'm hoping that this batch will come out particularly well. Mostly, because I want to write about it. And I'm mostly writing about it because I'm sitting here, the unhappy clam that I am, waiting to turn the granola every 10 minutes.

So this is what you need:

• 3 cups rolled oats
• a glob of molasses (~1.5 tbs)
• small palmful of brown sugar
• a capful of canola oil
• 2 tbs of some sort of nut butter (I used sunnutbutter- made from sunflower seeds)
• a sizable mound of honey (~1/3 cup)
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tsp almond extract
• a pinch or two of salt

Okay then, you have all your goods:

• mix together molasses and brown sugar with a fork until well combined
• add oil, nut butter, honey, extracts, and salt
• combine well
• examine your black substance and realize it resembles a mini BP oil spill, reflect on thisfor a moment, thank god you're not a sea turtle or sperm whale, and move on
• Mix well into rolled oats. This will take a few minutes of stirring and chopping with some sort of big spoon. You'll think it's too dry, but it's not... just keep mixing until everything is well coated.
• Spread out onto a big cookie sheet and bake at 350 for 25 minutes
• Every 10 minutes, take the sheet out to rake the edges in to the middle, and redistribute the granola around the tray.
• Voila! You have vanilla almond granola. Stir in any dried fruit you'd like. I stirred in black currents. Cherries or golden raisins would work really well too.

At 25 minutes I taste-tested and it had an amazing flavor. But I wanted it a teensy bit more crunchy. I put it back in the oven. This was a bad idea. I ended up baking mine for 31 minutes (instead of 25 like you should), and now it's too toasted. Adding to my grumpiness.... ugh.