Saturday, March 10, 2012

Grandma and Blueberries and Rings

I love blueberries and always have, since my dear, wonderful Grandmother made blueberry muffins for me when I stayed overnight at her house.  That sweet, fresh baked smell would waft into my bedroom at my grandparents' house when I woke up.  I'd get up and sit at the breakfast table and open a hot blueberry muffin and steam would rise out of it so the butter that I liberally smoothed into both halves would melt and ooze into the delicious cake and blueberries. The dough of the muffin would be almost wet with that sweet, hot butter and the combination was sheer heaven.
I knew Grandma loved blueberries, too, and our family had had a summer house in Grafton, New York, on top of a hill that had blueberries growing all around the house.  My parents took me to that summer house when I was 2 years old, and I've been told that they were picking blueberries into cans, only to find out that as fast as they picked, I was eating them!

These aren't my grandmother's hands.  Grandma's been gone about 20 years now, bless her.  But, they're one of my sister's hands as she was making the following recipe another sister found in a little book she'd kept from Grandma's things.   The sister whose hands are in the picture decided to make the recipe and I thought I'd share it with you here:

Double Blueberry Shortcake (more ingredients for the blueberry sauce are listed in instructions below):

2 cups sifted flour
2 T sugar
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 ts salt
1/2 cup butter
1 slightly beaten egg
1/2 cup milk
1 cup fresh blueberries

Sift together the dry ingredients, then cut in the butter.  Combine egg and milk, stir into flour mixture.  Divide dough in half, pat half into greased 8 x 1 1/2" round cake pan.   Top with berries.  On waxed paper, roll remaining dough to 8" circle.  Invert and fit dough over berries, remove paper, sprinkle dough with 2 tsps sugar.  Bake at 400 degrees for 25-30 minutes.   Cut into 6 wedges, serve with warm blueberry sauce:
In saucepan, mix 1/4 cup sugar and 1 1/2 T cornstarch...blend in 1 cup cold water..cook and stir till mixture is boiling.  Add 1 cup blueberries, cook 3 minutes and remove from heat.  Stir in 1 T lemon juice and 4 T butter.

Now for the part about the ring.  I inherited Grandma's diamond engagement ring, but the wedding band, tiny diamonds all around the ring, is ...all of ours.  I have more than 2 sisters, but that's all I'll say for anonymity sake.  So, every Christmas, at some point during the day, we have a fun little 'passing of Grandma's ring'  ceremony between all of us.  Each one gets to keep that ring for that whole year.   I notice that most of us wear it quite often during that year.  We adored both our grandmothers, we've always been lucky girls in respect to marvelous family, thank you, God.

SO, there was my sister, who'd received this recipe in the mail as we all did the other day, and she decided to try the recipe. As she was working with the dough, on her counter top, she realized she was wearing Grandma's ring.   Rolling out Grandma's recipe, wearing Grandma's ring.  And she sent the above picture to us all.  Kind of 'full circle', isn't it?  In more ways than one? :-)

I hope you try the recipe.  If Grandma made it, it'll be good.  Not only did we have marvelous family, but THEY COULD COOK! 

z

14 comments:

MathewK said...

Sounds really nice, but where's the pic of the finished product, then again it's a good thing you didn't put it up there, i can't be eating such nice sweet things.

I'm on a low carb, almost sugar free diet, trying to get my backside into shape. What think you Americans call a 'caboose'. :)

sue hanes said...

Z - That is a very touching and lovely story about your Grandmother.

I am generally not a muffin person - but I do like blueberry muffins - and also cranberry muffins.

Always On Watch said...

A recipe simple enough even for me!

Love the story about Grandma's ring, Z.

Brooke said...

I will have to try the recipe, and also, a wonderful story about your grandma!

Lisa said...

what a wonderful tribute to your Grandmaother Z and the leagacy of her bluberry shortcake keeping the tradition alive. It looks good and and too.

Z said...

thanks, everybody! I could just imagine what my sister felt when she realized she happened to have grandma's ring on while she made grandma's recipe for the first time, a recipe we didn't know still existed! actually, I spoke to my sis today and forgot to ask her how this tasted!

Lisa said...

I just read my comment made absolutely no sense . It was supposed to read "I am going to try and make it too. Geeez!!!!!

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
BB-Idaho said...

Some dozens of years back, I competed in a 'diet contest' with
several co-workers. We would 'weigh in' once a week for two months. Sort of an informal
WeightWatcher thing; the competition was fierce and we
were all losing 2-3 lbs a week.
Seeking an unfair advantage, one
competitor called my wife and asked
what food I could not resist. She
quickly answered (bless her heart)
that, "Oh, he will eat ANYTHING with blueberries". The last two
weeks of the contest, I would find
blueberry ice cream, blueberry cheesecake, blueberry muffins and blueberry shakes sitting on my desk
when I came in at 6AM.
....I lost the contest to everyone, but gee, it was worth it!

Ducky's here said...

We'd go wild blueberry picking in Maine in the summer.

There was just dad, me and my siblings.

But he baked a pretty good muffin. Those were good times.

CnC said...

I love me some BB muffins. I just get the mix with the can of BB. Im gonna have to try your Grams recipe when my
shoulder heals up some, God bless her and all our Grandma's for their wonderful cooking. thanks!

Ticker said...

The story of your Grandmother reminds me of my childhood and all the times I spent with my Grandmother or Mammy as she was called.
We picked blueberries, wild ones, as well but had to be very careful of copperheads who loved to hide in the low lying bushes waiting for birds to land and become a meal. Fortunately we had a "snake dog" who could smell and root out a copperhead in a heartbeat. Cricket(our snake dog) was our safety officer and made picking blueberries or any kind of berries much safer. Blueberries served with cold milk or homemade whipped cream were another treat along with the wonderful hot muffins that came out of that old wood fired stove oven. MMMMM. I can smell em baking now.

The Debonair Dudes World said...

Sounds Yummy.

Patra said...

Z - That is a very touching and lovely story about your Grandmother. I am generally not a muffin person - but I do like blueberry muffins - and also cranberry muffins.