Blueberry Sour Cream Ice Cream

In much of the US in recent days the weather has been just a bit warm shall we say?  I saw the forecast of the advancing heat wave, and prepared to hunker down: changed the filters in the air conditioning system, dug out shorts and tank tops, and closed the blinds against the strong afternoon sun.

And I made ice cream.

The Tuesdays With Dorie group choose Blueberry Sour Cream Ice Cream soon after I joined the group in 2008.  I didn't have an ice cream maker at the time, so I took and excused absence and baked something different that week.  But now that I'm trying to finish every recipe in Dorie Greenspan's book, Baking From My Home to Yours, and with a well-broken-in ice cream maker in its permanent spot on my kitchen counter, this week was the perfect time for me to make that recipe.

n.o.e.'s notes:

- You can find the recipe on the post of the original TWD host for this recipe, Chronicles of Culinary Curiosity.

-  Some lovely local blueberries came in my farm box, so that's what I used for the ice cream.    I like that Dorie gives flexibility to add sugar and lemon juice to taste; I added slightly less sugar and a solid dose of lemon juice.  I cut the amount of sour cream by a little bit because I didn't want it to mask the blueberry flavor.

-  After I finished making the ice cream base I gave it a little taste.  The blueberry flavor seemed a bit mild and I debated whether to make up more of the cooked, pureed blueberries and add them, but in the end I decided that I'd leave the ice cream as it was, and add some fresh blueberries or blueberry sauce when I served it, if we thought it needed something.

the verdict:

I brought this ice cream to dinner with some friends. (I packed it in this container so it wouldn't melt in the 106 degree heat)  Everyone finished eating the ice cream, but nobody raved.  To me it fell somewhere between "OK" and "not that great,"  The texture was nice and creamy, the sour cream added just the right amount of tang, but the blueberry flavor was too faint.  I think the ice cream could have benefited from a lot more blueberries.  My husband agreed, "Something about the blueberries didn't go with the creaminess."  It was cold, though, and a beautiful color!

Double Crusted Blueberry Pie

Here's a piece of life advice: the next time you make a pie, make the crust you need and then immediately make another batch of pie dough.  You've already got the recipe in front of you, the bowls and implements are already dirty, and you will not believe the virtuous feeling you will have when you slip the extra dough into the freezer, knowing that with a bit of work now you are saving yourself a lot of time later.
And later? When you look in your freezer and there is a nice disk or two of pie crust, you know that you can have a pie in the oven in a matter of minutes.  This week I found myself in just that situation.  I had some lovely local blueberries from my farm box order, and with the crust already made, I decided on the spur of the moment to bake Dorie Greenspan's Double Crusted Blueberry Pie.  Even though it was late afternoon, I was able to have it on the dinner table in short order. 


n.o.e.'s notes:

-  The original Tuesdays With Dorie host for this recipe in 2008 was Amy of South in your Mouth.  You can find the recipe on her blog post.  I'm going a bit out of order, but this is a recipe I'm baking in my plan to finish all of the recipes in Dorie Greenspan's book, Baking From My Home to Yours.

- I made half of the pie recipe in my little 7" mini metal pie pan.  I had actually rolled out and frozen a crust right in the pan.  All I needed to do was to fill the pie and roll out the top crust.  The crust thawed as I mixed up the filling.

-  Sometimes blueberry pies can be runny in the middle from all the juice released by the cooking blueberries.  Dorie combats that in two ways: adding a hefty dose of flour to the blueberries, and lining the bottom of the pie crust with dried breadcrumbs.  I don't use prepared breadcrumbs, but usually make mine by crumbling and baking fresh bread.  I was feeling lazy, though, so I skipped the crumb layer.  I added flour to my blueberries, but somehow forgot to add the full amount that I'd measured out.  As it turned out, the pie was perfect, not at all runny and also not dry.

-  The recipe calls for tossing the berries with lemon zest, sugar, flour, salt, and lemon juice.  Dorie gives measurements but advises that we add the amounts to taste, which makes sense because blueberries can vary in sweetness.  I used a bit less sugar (and I used palm sugar) and a healthy squirt of lemon juice.

- So great was my laziness that I also skipped the egg wash on the crust.  Luckily my pie turned out nice and golden anyway.

 
the verdict:

I served this pie at a family dinner last evening, and my husband and daughter agreed that it was an exceptionally excellent blueberry pie!  The lemon zest and juice added a sparkle and brought out the flavor of the berries.  This will be a "go-to" pie in the summer (or even out-of-season with frozen blueberries), especially if I have pie crust in the freezer!

Blueberry Sauce Muffins

Happy Fourth of July! There's nothing more all-American than a good blueberry muffin to start your day. Or for a mid-morning snack. Or lunch. These muffins are so good that you might just find yourself grabbing one any time you get near the kitchen.

All too often blueberry muffins are tasteless, cakey, and boring. These avoid that fate by including dried and fresh blueberries cooked into a delicious blueberry sauce and swirled into the batter. It is a recipe from Cook's Illustrated that I first saw at Obsessed With Baking. (If you haven't been to Steph's blog, click over; you'll be in for a treat!)


n.o.e.'s notes

- I didn't have any fresh blueberries on hand so I used Wyman's frozen wild blueberries. They turned the batter pretty much purple, but the muffins baked up light. Wild blueberries are critically important in blueberry baked goods, so if I can't find wild ones fresh, I use frozen. To me the big domesticated ones just don't have enough flavor when baked.

- Typical of CI, this recipe mixes the ingredients in an interesting order. The berries are added to the wet ingredients before the flour is stirred in, rather than being folded in at the end. This keeps the muffins from being over-mixed.

- I cut the sugar to 5.5 oz (instead of 8 oz). I wasn't paying attention and added the sugar with flour mixture at first then had to try to separate it out. Luckily that mishap didn't seem to harm the finished muffins.

- So often muffin recipes make only 9 or 10 muffins. I liked that this batter filled 12 muffin cups.

- I baked them at 390 for 20+ minutes.


the verdict:

This is a GOOD blueberry muffin! The swirled sauce provides a shot of blueberry goodness, and the dried blueberries really add to the flavor intensity. This is my new go-to blueberry muffin.

Bread 2.5 x .40 = Bread 1.0

Just in case you don't have, say, 8 or 9 very ripe bananas lying around, or you just want to make 1 loaf of Bread 2.5, you could always make 40% of the recipe!

This should work:

Bread 1.0

1 cup whole wheat flour
1 1/6 cup white flour or a mix of white flour and white whole wheat (King Arthur)
1/3 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
scant 1/2 tsp salt
1 cup mashed ripe banana
1/2 cup brown sugar
scant 1/4 cup oil
1 cup plain nonfat yogurt or buttermilk
1 egg plus 1 egg white (or no eggs)
1 cup ground nuts/oats (no more than half oats)
1 cup fresh or frozen wild blueberries

Wholesome Goodness

Today it was time to bake bread - well the easy, quick variety. Over time I've devised a good and healthy whole wheat banana blueberry bread that I try to keep on hand. Whenever I have ripe bananas, I mash them and then measure and freeze the puree for baking time.

I call this Bread 2.5, because that is how much of just about everything goes into this bread. And it makes 2.5 loaves. AND it’s 2.5 times better for you than other muffins and scones - this bread is very low in fat and sugar and is packed with nutrients.

It changes nearly every time I make it. Once I left out the eggs completely (by accident) and it was delicious – dense and moist. So if you have anyone in your family with egg allergies (Hi, Bob!) you can omit the eggs. OTOH, if you wish to boost the protein content, you can use all 4. Today I used 2 eggs' worth of Egg Beaters.

Bread 2.5

Ingredients:

2 ½ cups whole wheat flour
2 ½ cups white flour
1/3 cup white whole wheat flour (King Arthur)
¾ tsp baking soda
2 ½ tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2 ½ cups mashed banana
1 ¼ cup brown sugar (I use half dark brown and half light brown)
½ cup oil
2 ½ cups plain nonfat yogurt or buttermilk
0 – 4 eggs (or equivalent in egg substitute)
2 ½ cups of ground nuts (toasted is nice) and whole oats mixed (I used 1 cup walnuts, 1 cup pecan meal, 1/2 cup oats), no more than half oats
2 ½ cups fresh or frozen wild blueberries

{update: I've added a few ingredients that make this bread even more wonderful: about 1 tsp lemon juice to the wet ingredients, and some cinnamon and nutmeg to the dry - just around a teaspoon or less of each}

Directions:

1. Mix dry ingredients in bowl (flours, soda, powder and salt)

2. Mix banana, sugar, oil, yogurt and eggs in a very large bowl


3. Add the dry ingredients to the banana mixture in three stages, stirring to incorporate.

4. Stir in nut mixture

5. Stir in blueberries

6. Pour batter into 2 full size and one half size loaf pans.


7. Bake at 325 for 55 minutes or until done.



Slice and enjoy! It's really delicious toasted.