Blueberries!

They're finally ready......hanging in beautiful blue bunches, waiting to be picked.....blueberries!

I had two little helpers, but they mostly wanted to goof off.

We're so lucky to be renting a house that had several mature blueberry bushes when we moved in. Every year we get loads of berries and we put forth zero effort to maintain the bushes. When we find a house to buy, it has to have enough land for a garden and several fruit trees...and some blueberry bushes. I picked 6 cups of berries today in 30 minutes or so.

Tonight after dinner, this is what I did with 5 cups of them.

And later, after our evening walk, a slice of warm pie with a scoop of vanilla ice cream is going to be the bomb!

Easy-Peasy Pie

As promised, here is a recipe for the easiest blueberry pie ever. It's pretty darn tasty, too!

Easy-Peasy Blueberry Pie

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

In a large bowl, combine 4 cups of fresh blueberries, 1 cup of sugar (more or less depending on how sweet or tart your berries happen to be), 3 heaping tbsp. of cornstarch, a sprinkle of cinnamon, and the juice of half a lemon.

Pour the blueberry/sugar mixture into a prepared deep dish pie crust (I like Pillsbury's).  Dot the top of the berries with pats of butter. I like to cut a 2nd crust into long strips and then weave a lattice on top, but you could just put the whole thing on there (with small slashes cut in to let steam escape).

Pop that baby into the oven and let it bake for about 50 minutes, or until golden brown on top and bubbling. Make sure you have something underneath to catch any errant juices that escape! Let the pie cool, then enjoy.

I tried this recipe with peaches instead of blueberries the other day, and it was great, too! I did decrease the sugar a bit, since the peaches were sweeter than the berries. I got a picture of that one to share:

The lattice is far from perfect, but the pie was delicious anyway!

Bright spots

In a week filled with rainy days, work angst, and onerous household/personal obligations, there were a few bright spots for me this first week of July.

A newly fledged house sparrow flew in to our garage yesterday, and couldn't figure out how to get back out. He kept fluttering up against a window pane instead of just flying back out through the open door. I walked up to him very slowly, and gently cupped my hands around him, and carried him outside.  He didn't protest at all. Although I've rescued and released a lot of orphaned wild baby birds, there's still nothing like holding a tiny little scrap of trusting, warm fluff in your hands. This happened before I left for work yesterday, and brightened my morning.

Speaking of work, readers that I connect with that shop at my bookstore are rare. When they do show up, it's always wonderful to trade recommendations with them. The other day I met a woman about my age with excellent taste in books (well, my taste, anyway!). We had a great conversation, and she is British, so she had the most wonderful accent! When she was leaving, she pointed to the stack of books she was about to purchase and said, "This is brilliant! Thank you so much!"  Meeting her (and her "this is brilliant" line) made my day!

Third bright spot: homemade blueberry pies! I've discovered a great easy pie recipe to use the berries we're currently picking in our backyard. I've made two so far, and will post the recipe later in the week.

What sorts of things are brightening up your week, dear readers?

Blueberries, finally!

It's the end of June, and finally we have the first ripe blueberries ready to pick! This has been a slower season than most. We usually start getting berries two weeks earlier than this.

Just turning ripe.

 Blueberries are a nutritional superfood, loaded with vitamins and antioxidants. Plus they are just delicious! We're very fortunate to live in a rental house that had these bushes established when we moved in. No work has been required on our part, and we get loads of these beautiful berries every summer!

Now I'm off to try to make a deep-dish blueberry pie. My mouth is watering just thinking about it. There's nothing in the world any better than fresh summer fruits!