making sal proud

No matter how many candles accumulate atop my birthday cake, I still find that nothing captures my imagination better than a really well-written, well-illustrated children’s book. A properly-told story captures the freedom and whimsy that came naturally to us as finger-painting, play-acting toddlers.

There were seasonal favorites in our little-one library; I still get the urge to read Happy Winter (as a 23-year-old!) every time Christmas rolls around. But for summer, there was Blueberries for Sal, in which a little girl spends most of her time among the berry bushes plunking fruit into her mouth, not her pail. Despite never having picked blueberries myself, I could almost feel the warm sun on my back whenever I opened that book.

Recently, I got to recreate Sal’s plotline when Ted and I headed to his hometown blueberry patch outside of Richmond. Now, overshooting on hand-picked berries seems like it’d be hard to do, right? It’s not like picking apples or peaches; bead-sized objects are slower to fill a bucket than fist-sized ones. The concentration it takes to find and reach the ripest fruit is intense, and by the time the early-morning clouds parted to reveal a hot midday sun, sweat was pouring down our faces.

But when you reached into an especially dense thicket of blueberries, the spheres would just roll into your hands. Then you’d start challenging your companion to see who could pick faster, and there’s just something about friendly competition that sharpens your focus. Plus, listening to the giggly gossip of the women in the next row provides a happily distracting soundtrack. Your pails would be full before you knew it.

So even after gorging ourselves on plenty of the pickings, we walked away as proud owners of twelve. pounds. of blueberries.

After full-bellied nap, it was clear that blueberry cobbler was our destiny. Standing around the kitchen island with Ted’s family, snacking on pre-dinner appetizers, the entire recipe came together in the time it took to have a nice catch-up conversation. Bubbling and biscuit-topped, servings of the deep purple cobbler stained our white plates after dinner, slumping under melting vanilla ice cream. People, let me tell you: all that hard work was so worth it.

We baked this amazing cobbler again as soon as we made it home—but, of course, it barely made a dent in our massive berry supply. Thus began a whirlwind week of preservation, a race to beat the inevitable over-ripening of the fruit. I’m proud to say that we beat the odds: two people, twelve pounds of fruit, and seven days later, we had a wealth of canned, baked, and frozen blueberry goodness at our fingertips, halted at the peak of freshness for (more leisurely) future enjoyment. Sal would be very proud.

Out of that temporary insanity came some really excellent treats. Over the next week, I’ll be sharing them with you here. Because, you know, you should really have a few recipes in your arsenal for that day you walk in the front door with two buckets of berries and purple-stained fingers.

BLUEBERRY COBBLER
Serves 6
Adapted from Food & Wine

Ingredients
- 5 cups blueberries (about 2 pints)
- 1 cup plus 2 tsp. flour
- 5 Tbsp. sugar, divided
- 1 tsp. kirsch (or kirschwasser in German, a clear brandy made from cherries; can be found at your local liquor store)
- 1/2 tsp. grated lemon zest
- 2 tsp. baking powder
- 1/4 tsp. salt
- 5 Tbsp. unsalted butter
- 1/2 cup plus 1 Tbsp. milk
- vanilla ice cream, for serving

Preparation
1) Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
2) In a 9×12″ oval baking dish, toss blueberries with 2 tsp. of the flour, 4 Tbsp. of the sugar, the kirsch and the lemon zest.
3) Stir together the remaining 1 cup flour and 4 Tbsp. sugar with the baking powder and salt. Cut the butter in—your hands will work quite well here—until the butter is evenly distributed and the mixture resembles coarse meal. Pour in 1/2 cup of the milk and mix until just combined; you will end up with a very soft dough.
4) Drop the dough atop the berries in spoonfuls. Use half the remaining milk to coat your hands, then spread out the dough over the blueberries; when you’re done, brush the rest of the milk on top of the dough.
5) Bake the cobbler for about 35 minutes in the middle of the oven. When the crust is golden brown and the berries are bubbling, you’ll know it’s done. Serve warm with ice cream.