Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Peach Cobbler

As a member of ShopRite's Potluck Blog Panel, I received a gift card earlier in the month to head down to my local ShopRite here in Brooklyn to purchase some fresh local New Jersey fruits. Now, I am a big fan of using fruit in baking during the summer months (read: pie, cobbler, crisp, more pie, repeat) so I couldn't resist picking up some fresh New Jersey blueberries and peaches for use in my next baking experiment. I came up with this terrific recipe for a blueberry-peach cobbler which is just loaded with fresh summer fruits. The recipe doesn't overload on sugar, so it really showcases how good the fruit you use is - in my case, the very best peaches I've had yet this summer!

Sasha's Blueberry Peach Cobbler
Fruit filling
6 ripe peaches
2 cups blueberries
1/2 cup sugar
1 T lemon juice
1/2 tsp cinnamon
3 T cornstarch

Cobbler Top
1 1/2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/3 cup sugar
5 T butter (chopped into small pieces)
1 egg
1/4 cup heavy cream

Combine the ingredients for the fruit topping in a bowl and toss. Place into a 9x6 inch or similar casserole dish and spread evenly. To prepare the top of the cobbler, combine the dry ingredients and mix in the butter (after chopping into small piece) using our hands to combine. Mix in the egg and heavy cream to make a nice moist dough.

unbaked cobbler!

Spoon the dough on top of the fruit in lumps, or cobblestones, as I like to think of it. Bake for about 50 minutes until golden brown and until the cobblestones come out clean when a toothpick is inserted.

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Peach Cobbler

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Souffle

You know I love blueberries, so when I received a gift card from ShopRite as part of my participation in the PotLuck ShopRite blog program to go to my local ShopRite in Brooklyn and buy some of ShopRite's local New Jersey fruits, I knew that blueberries were the way to go. Now, I love farmers market fruit, but it is so expensive. I was truly impressed with the quality and freshness of ShopRite's peaches and blueberries that I bought for use in two desserts last weekend - a peach/blueberry cobbler and a blueberry souffle. Both were fresh and juicy with vibrant colors, just they way they should be. Perfect, locally grown fruit that was just right for use in these two recipes and doesn't break the bank.

Blueberry Souffle (recipe from derived from the Food Network)
1 T butter, melted
1/2 cup granulated sugar, plus 1 T for dusting the souffle dishes
1/3 cup fresh blueberries
3 egg yolks
5 egg whites

Preheat the oven to 400 before you begin. Butter the insides of 4 10 ounce ramekins and lightly dust each with a bit of sugar. Beat the egg yolks with 1/4 cup fi sugar and then beat in the blueberry puree, beating well. Whisk the egg whites in a stand mixer on high. Once foamy, add the remaining sugar slowly while beating on high for several minutes until meringue like peaks form. Fill the souffle dishes to the brim and smooth the tops. Bake the souffles in the middle of the oven for ten to twelve minutes.

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Souffle

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Crumbles

Happy independence America! Fourth of July usually means blueberry time in my house. Usually that's a blueberry pie, but this year I actually made a three layer giant chocolate cake with buttercream frosting and lovely floral decorations, which will be the subject of a future post. I was pretty much all butter-ed out after that, so I made a much healthier dessert for our Sunday night dinner - a blueberry crumble. This dessert has much less butter than a pie crust, but the same delicious fresh local blueberries in that filling and just a little but of crumble on the top. So perfect. I made four individual sized desserts from the recipe below, which worked out really well. So well, that I certainly will try it with some other fruits soon. Happy red, white and blue today - but especially blue(berry). Perfect way to cheer yourself up a bit.

Sasha's Blueberry Crumble
4 cups fresh blueberries, squeezed by hand
1/4 cup plus 1 T sugar
3 T plus 1 tsp flour
3 T lemon juice
3 T unsalted butter, cold, chopped into small pieces
1 tsp ground cinnamon
pinch of salt
10 nilla cookies
1/4 cups rolled Quaker oats

Preheat the oven to 375. Combine the blueberries, 1/4 cup sugar, 3 T of flour, and lemon juice in a bowl. In a second bowl, combine the chopped butter, cinnamon, salt, and remaining sugar and flour. Work with your hands gently until it forms a coarse, crumb/crumble like mixture - a bit like wet sand.

Spray four five ounce ramekins with Pam and divide the blueberry mixture. Top with the crumble topping. Bake for about 25 minutes until you have bubbling little caldrons (maybe all the witches from last night's True Blood are influencing my writing here?), and then they are done. Allow to cool enough to eat. Delicious!

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Crumbles

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Muffins

Blueberries are one of my favorite summer fruits. Lately , I have been getting some pretty fantastic blueberries from the farmers market here in Park Slope. Some went into that blueberry peach pie I posted recently, and there were just too many delicious blueberries not to make some blueberry muffins.  I never make my muffins with butter. Many people do and I am sure they are good, it's just that if I wanted to load them up with butter, I'd just make some cupcakes. Hence, my banana pecan muffins are also butter free. These blueberry muffins were delicious and the recipe I came up with wound up making about one and a half dozen. Use the best blueberries you can find - freshly picked ones from that summer farmers' market are idea. This is a great way to brighten up a sunday morning!

Sasha's Blueberry Muffins
3 cups flour
7 T canola oil
1/2 tsp salt
3 tsp baking powder
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs'
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup milk
2 cups fresh blueberries

Preheat the oven to 375. Combine the baking powder, salt and flour in a bowl with the sugar. Mix in the other ingredients (eggs, canola oil, vanilla, milk and blueberries) and combine well in a bowl. Divide in muffin tins and bake for about 30 minutes until just golden and toothpick clean. Allow to cool and unmold. Eat right away!

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Muffins

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Peach Pie

Another pie. Is that all I do in the summer, make pies? Well maybe. There's nothing better than a delicious fruit pie in the summer, made with fresh farmers' market fruits from the Brooklyn Greenmarket.  I swear, I've been making other things too - its not like we have pie for dinner every night, you know. And I promise I will be posting some of those soon as well. Peaches and blueberries are in high season. I didn't have enough peaches to make a peach pie, but I had some pretty amazing blueberries from the farmers' market so I threw them together. The result was pretty spectacular, and one of my best pies to date. 
To make this pie, I used the exact same crust for apple pie, with my own peach and blueberry filling.

Sasha's Peach Blueberry Pie
2 1/4 cups flour
big pinch of Kosher salt
pinch of sugar
2 sticks of cold butter
1/4 cup of ice water, plus a but more if needed (this time I used about 2 T additional ice water)

21/2 cups of fresh peaches, peeled and sliced
2 1/2 cups of fresh blueberries, squished with your hands
1/2 cup of sugar

1 T lemon juice
1/2 tsp cinnamon
4 T cornstarch
2 egg yolks

To make the pie crust, follow the detailed instructions that I gave in writing about apple pie.  Basically, combine the salt, sugar and flour in a bowl. Cut up the butter into small chunks and gently incorporate with your hands into the flour. Splash the ice water into the mixture, and mold until it *just* forms  a ball of dough, adding more water as needed so it just sticks together (be sure to add the water slowly so not to overdo it). The key to a good pie crust is not to overwork the dough, so it is best to do this by hand. There will still be clumps of butter in the dough - don't worry about that, as it will make the crust more rustic and also crisper. Divide the dough and bring into two balls. Plastic wrap and refrigerate for exactly twenty minutes to allow the dough to firm a bit.

Roll out one of the balls on a well floured surface, rotating after each roll or two so it does not stick to your surface. Roll to 1/4 of an inch thick and place in the pie dish, before trimming the edges with a pastry scissor. Using a pyrex pie dish is best.

Combine the ingredients for the fruit mixture. You should peel the peaches before slicing, and squish the blueberries a bit with your hands. Add most of this to the pie - about four and a half cups total. 

Roll out the second ball of dough the same way and cut to form a lattice. I glazed the top of the pie using two egg yolks and sprinkled some granulated sugar on top. Bake the pie at 425 covered with foil for 30 minutes. Then, reduce the heat to 350 and remove the foil baking for another 30-45 minutes (my oven required about 35). The pie is done when it is tender when poked with a knife.

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Peach Pie

Sasha's Kitchen: Strawberry-Blueberry Popsicles

Popsicles are the perfect summer treat. I had never made my own before, but really why not? It's easy enough to do if you have the right molds, and nothing could be a more refreshing summer treat than making your own with fresh local fruits and berries. I came across some basic recipes in Bon Appetit  and decided to give it a try using some popsicle molds that I bought at the Brooklyn Kitchen in Williamsburg. The molds are from a company called Tovolo than makes great freezer pop and ice cream sandwich molds. The key to making good popsicles from fresh fruit is balancing the fruit with a bit of citrus. I can't wait to use the molds again to make these banana pudding and chocolate sea salt pops next time!

Strawberry-Blueberry Popsicles (from Bon Appetit)
strawberry portion
1 lb fresh strawberries, hulled and halved
1/4 cup sugar
1 tsp fresh lemon juice

blueberry portion
12 oz fresh blueberries
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp fresh lime juice

Puree the strawberries, sugar and lemon juice in a food processor with 1/4 cup of water until smooth. Strain using a wire mesh strainer, pressing on solids to extract the puree. Set aside. Puree the blueberries, sugar and lime juice with 3 T of water in a food processor, and once again, strain.

Pour some of the strawberry puree into the popsicle molds and freeze until just firm, about 30 minutes. Then, pour some of the blueberry puree on top and freeze for 30 minutes, alternating layers as you choose to. I just made bi-color strawberry-blueberry ice pops. One done, add caps and freeze until firm. To eat, dip bottoms of molds in hot water for 20-30 seconds to loosen the pops.

Sasha's Kitchen: Strawberry-Blueberry Popsicles

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Ice Cream

Summer is just around the corner, which means that it's berry time.  It's so easy to make your own ice cream at home, using a conventional ice cream maker.  Making ice cream at home is much easier that it sounds and simply requires some freezing time and a very limited amount of prep work.  I have made a variety of flavors but this time, decided to try something that was perfect for the early summer - blueberry ice cream.  It came out great - nice and creamy with a perfect blueberry flavor.  I love the color purple, so the best part about this ice cream was the fabulous deep purple color!  This recipe is totally my own original recipe.  You will find that most blueberry ice cream recipes out there may use even more yolks than I did, but it really isn't needed.  This was creamy, delicious and oh so very blueberry.  I should add that I live next to a gourmet ice cream store, but I still like to make my own ice cream.  Next up will be peach in June (with fresh organic peaches of course).

Sasha's Blueberry Ice Cream
2 cups fresh blueberries
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
1 cup whole milk
7 egg yolks

First, combine 1/2 a cup of the sugar with the blueberrries and cook over medium heat for about five minutes.  In the meantime, heat the milk and heavy cream with the remaining sugar for a few minutes until the sugar is dissolved.  Beat the egg yolks separately and add to one cup of the warm milk mixture. Then combine in full and continue heating for about 10 minutes until nice and thick, until the custard coats the back of a spoon.  Add the blueberry mixture and then freeze according the the manufacturer's instructions for your ice cream maker.

Blueberry Ice Cream

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Ice Cream

Sasha's Kitchen: Simple Blueberry Goat Cheese Salad

My Dad and my stepmother, Kim, keep a kosher home.  My husband and I are not as great about keeping kosher, but we do try in certain regards (which is why I never prepare pork-based products, and use Empire chicken;  I'm not so great with sea-life, however).  When we first moved to Brooklyn, they gave us a kosher cookbook as part of our housewarming gift, called Kosher By Design, Short On Time.  This book actually has some pretty tasty kosher recipes, all of which are easy to make, including a recipe for blueberry salad.  My blueberry salad is very different from the one in that book, but it does contain blueberries and a blueberry colored dressing that is just the pretties shade of purplish-blue.  Also, it looks creamy, but there is no cream at all in the dressing and its actually pretty healthy (not to mention all those antioxidants in the blueberries).

Dressing
1/2 cup canola oil
1/4 cup white wine vinegar
handfull of blueberries
2 T water
1/2 tsp dijon mustard
1/2 tsp honey

Salad
romaine lettuce or hearts of romaine
a couple handfulls of blueberries
1/4 cup chopped pecans
crumbled goat cheese

I should probably mention that it is a blustery and cold five degrees outside.  Blueberries are not in season and will not be in season for some time, but I had a blueberry craving, probably because I wish it was warm again.  Thus, although the blueberries I found at the grocery store are actually pretty high quality, they were a bit on the expensive side.  However, this does make wonderful and fresh summer salad, especially with a glass of Chardonnay.

If you prefer strawberries, I encourage you to check out Eric In Jersey City's Strawberry Salad, and if you like citrus fruit, check out my Mandarin Orange Salad With Caramelized Almonds.

Sasha's Kitchen: Simple Blueberry Goat Cheese Salad

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Pie

I could not resist posting my blueberry pie recipe. Blueberry pie is my favorite pie recipe and although this is not seasonal (unless perhaps you live in California), it is a nice corollary to the apple pie recipe.

First make the pie dough following my recipe for apple pie.

Divide the dough into two balls - one for the pie crust and one for the lattice.

Prepare the pie crust in the pie dish you are using with one of the balls of the crust dough. I absolutely love the pie dishes at Mackenzie Childs, as they make gorgeous service pieces that are a bit different from your run of the mill cookware.

To make the filling:

3-4 pints blueberries (depending on the size of your pie dish). I usually use 3 pints
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
1 1/2 T lemon juice

Before you mix the filling you should wash and squeeze the blueberries, by squishing them with my hands.

Fill the pie. and then prepare a lattice by rolling out the other ball of dough and cutting into strips.

Prepare an egg wash glaze by mixing one egg yolk with 1 T heavy cream.

Bake for 20 minutes at 400 F and then for 40-50 minutes at 350 F.

Sasha's Kitchen: Blueberry Pie