Gluten Free Blueberry Pancakes

Pancakes are among my favorite ways to start off my weekends.  There's really nothing much better than quickly mixing up a bowl of pancake batter, ladling it onto a hot griddle, and watching it transform into a fluffy and tasty breakfast treat. I've become a bit of a pancake snob in recent years, thanks to my sister, who's without a doubt a bigger pancake obsessed person than I am.  Pancakes from a box are a big no-no.  In my opinion, there's no reason to ever make pancakes from a box, given that they're completely effortless to make from scratch (and they also taste way, way better).  Seriously, I have yet to taste a Bisquick pancake that's as fluffy and tangy as my favorite homemade buttermilk pancakes. 


And then my mom went gluten-free, and suddenly, I was in a predicament.  My mom usually isn't much of a big breakfast person, as she tends to be happy with just coffee and toast, but she does love pancakes.  Blueberry pancakes, especially.  I couldn't very well make my own homemade pancakes to enjoy on the weekend to have my mom watch on without any pancakes on her plate (because what kind of person denies their mother of buttermilk pancakes, right?), so I had to figure out how to make the perfect batch of gluten free pancakes that could hold their own next to my traditional favorites.

Gluten-Free Blueberry Muffins

I finally did it! I finally took the plunge and made something that's traditionally made with wheat flour and made a gluten-free version.  The idea of gluten-free baking always intimidated me, mostly because all the recipes I had ever seen involved a million different flours and xantham gum and other stabilizers and I don't know what else. Arrowroot powder sounded like such a foreign thing and it just weirded me out.  I'd been meaning to make gluten free desserts for a long time, in an attempt to cater to more people, but honestly, I was just too nervous about it to give it a real chance.  It seems silly now, because it's still baking and following a set of instructions, just with a different group of ingredients.  It wasn't until the need for gluten free treats hit close to home that I realized I needed to gather my courage, do my research, and do what I do best: bake.

My mom has been on a gluten free diet for just about a month now, and I still can't believe it at times.  I mean, she's the one who taught me how to bake!  It's ironic, to say the least.  In any case though, it's amazing what this new diet has done for her.  She was feeling better within days, and she'll never look back.  Since starting her new diet, my mom has been experimenting with different gluten free baked goods from the store, and while we have found some that are pretty good, we've definitely been disappointed with a lot of them.  Some of the things we've tried were way too sweet or tough, and don't even get me started on the loaves of sliced bread...now those are frightening.  Recently, she bought a couple of gluten free blueberry muffins and was not happy with them at all.  I promised my mom that blueberry muffins would be the first gluten free treat I would make. 

Blueberry Cornbread Buckle

Here's another short post for this week for those of you who are still hanging on to the last days of summer- Blueberry Cornbread Buckle!  A buckle, in case you don't know, is a single layer cake that is topped with fruit and a streusel crumb topping.  The fruits sink into the cake as the cake bakes, and the streusel gives the cake a buckled appearance when it comes out of the oven.  This buckle uses my favorite summer flavor combination of corn and blueberry to make a delicious rustic dessert.

The cornbread cake can be made with just a bowl and a hand-mixer, and it comes together very quickly. There's nothing unusual about it; it's just a straightforward cake.  The cake batter is poured into a square pan and topped with sugared blueberries, and is followed by a generous sprinkling of a quick streusel topping. About an hour or so in the oven, and dessert is ready!

Lemony Dutch Baby with Mixed Berry Sauce

We did it, we did it! We made it all the way to Friday.  The weekend is here and it's time to have some fun, do nothing, bake some treats, and sleep in.  Sleeping in...HA!  As if I do that on the weekends.  I mean, I guess waking up at 8 in the morning on weekends instead of 6:30 is slightly better, but I really just long for a lazy, lazy, lazy Saturday or Sunday where I wake up at 11 am, that critical hour where it's too late to really eat breakfast but too early to eat lunch.  The only obvious solution to such a critical dilemma is to simply make something delicious and special for breakfast, and pretend it's a substantial lunch meal anyway.

That's exactly what I chose to do last weekend (minus the waking up at 11 am part).  I woke up at my normal weekend hour, and just wasn't in the mood for breakfast.  I'm not sure why, because I've grown to really like having breakfast every morning, but this past Sunday I was just not feeling it. Maybe I was lazy, maybe I wanted to change up my routine, maybe a bit of both.  Whatever my reasons for not having breakfast that day were, I found myself at the critical 11 am hour hungry and in need of food.  I hadn't had breakfast, and it was too early for lunch, so I did the only reasonable thing and made myself a Dutch Baby for lunch.  I wouldn't call it brunch, because there was no lunch element to this meal, aside from the time it was consumed.  This was pure breakfast for lunch.

Sweet Corn Ice Cream with Blueberry Sauce

Today on the blog we have a recipe for sweet corn ice cream that's been topped off with a delicious blueberry sauce...wait. Are you experiencing slight feelings of déjà vu?  Does this sound a little familiar?  Didn't I only just publish a recipe containing both blueberry and corn flavorings.  If you read last week's post, you'll know that I was a sick soul with a need for the comfort that only homemade pancakes could provide, and that the pancakes that provided that much needed comfort came in the form of blueberry and cornmeal goodness.  Just writing about those pancakes makes me crave them again, because they were really that good.  It seems like I must have really liked that flavor combination because less than a week after those pancakes were made, I was back in the kitchen making something with the same flavor profile. 

My pancakes from last weekend may have been the catalyst that drove me to make this ice cream, but this is one of those recipes that I've been meaning to make for a long time and just never got around to actually making. I first learned about sweet corn ice cream last summer and I thought it was such a brilliant idea.  It seemed like the perfect ice cream for celebrating the best of summer, and I just had to make it...except that I never did.  I really wanted to, but I would always somehow either forget to buy corn or some other recipe that I just had to make crossed my path.  Before I knew it, summer was over and delicious sweet corn was nonexistent.  I told myself last year that I could not let next summer pass by without churning up a batch of sweet corn ice cream, and here it is!

Cornmeal and Blueberry Pancakes

 
The blog and all my social media channels have been unusually quiet as of late.  I mean, I'm not the biggest user of social media (something I hope to improve on!), but I typically have an Instagram-worthy photo of something delicious to share on a fairly regular basis, at the least.  Or, I'll share something scrumptious and delightful that I've found somewhere in the land of the Internet on Facebook.  Or, I'll have something posted by Tuesday, so that my typical two posts per week are nicely spaced out.  None of that is happening this week.  I wish I could say it was because I've been a busy little bee working on secret projects or off on a super top secret foodie adventure (I wish), but the truth is that my single, lonely recipe post of the week and social absence is the result of something far less exciting.  I was just too darn sick to cook anything this past weekend.

Although I guess that's not totally true, because I'm here talking about pancakes (or I will be in a moment).  I woke up in a slight funk on Friday morning and by Friday night I just felt baaadd (great Fourth of July, right?), and on Saturday morning I woke up feeling even worse.  I usually like to play tough and skip out on going to the doctor, but thankfully my mom got angry at me and made me go (thank you, mama!).  I got a bunch of prescriptions that didn't really make me feel any better, but they did a great job at making feel really really sleepy, so I ended up sleeping through what I had been hoping would be a productive, food-centered Saturday (not like I would have been able to actually make anything had I not gotten drowsy  medication, but whatever).  I still felt pretty sick and pretty sleepy on Sunday, but I forced myself out of bed to make something to share on the blog.  I just had to make at least one thing, and while I originally had plans for more elaborate things to prepare, life got in the way.  I was sick and the oven was off-limits because our air conditioning stopped working over the weekend (I'm happy to report that it works now!), so I needed something comforting and really quick to make that was either no-bake or stovetop-only.  Pancakes seemed like the most obvious solution. 

Buttermilk Panna Cotta with Mixed Berries

It's almost here, it's almost here! It's almost the Fourth of July! With this holiday now less than a week away, it's time to whip up some delicious and summer treats in our favorite shades of red, white, and blue.  For me, red and blue mean BERRIES.  Artificially dyed treats like cupcakes and cookies dyed in unnatural shades of colors really weird me out (pastel is ok, but super bright and fluorescent is just not ok), so strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries are my way of getting my red and blue fix.  Actually, the ultimate red, white, and blue dessert for me would be a simple bowl of strawberries and blueberries topped off with a dollop of freshly whipped cream.  It's the easiest thing in the world to make and it screams summer.  

I thought that I would take a cue from my ultimate easy summer dessert as a starting point for a simple and refined approach to a Fourth of July dessert.  Berries with fresh whipped cream has turned into panna cotta with macerated berries; it sounds fancy, but it's still a really easy dessert!  In Italian, panna cotta means "cooked cream," and that's literally what this dessert is. Panna cotta is traditionally a mixture of heavy cream, milk, sugar, and gelatin that gets cooked together, poured into a mold or cup, and then left in the fridge to chill until solidified. It's a very straightforward dish, and takes very little effort and time to prepare.  Essentially, if you can prepare a batch of Jell-O, you should have no problem making panna cotta.

Mini Berry Flag Tarts for the Make and Takes Blog!

Can you believe that we're at the end of June already!? I can't.  I'm in denial that we've already reached the end of the first month of summer.  Sure, there're two months left, but that seems like such a short amount of time, considering that there's all kinds of summery activities that I still need to do.  I still need to get my hands on a Mister Softee cone, an Italian ice from Ralphs, a burger from All American, and a Long Island lobster roll.  I can't let summer get by without these four things escaping from me (there's more, obviously, but these are my priority). While I'm still going to have to come to terms with the fact that it's practically July, I'm actually really excited about Independence Day next week.  A holiday that celebrates cookouts and barbecues and berry desserts and has fireworks at the end is my kind of holiday!  

I have a few themed desserts for the Fourth in mind, but I'm starting out with something super simple.  Having intricate desserts is nice and all, but sometimes, we just need something we can put together fast, with minimal effort and without needing to heat up our kitchens.  These mini berry tartlets do just that.  Little mini phyllo shells are filled with a delicious white chocolate filling and topped off with fresh berries.  They're incredibly simple to make, and when arranged in our iconic stars and stripes, are the perfect dessert for the Fourth of July (or, if you're a World Cup fan, for tomorrow's game- USA! USA!).  Head on over to the Make and Takes blog for the full recipe and more photos.  Enjoy, and happy summer!

Double Berry Crumb Bars

Happy Friday, everyone! Happy May, too!  Apparently, there's lots to be happy about.  The fact that we've finally reached the weekend, the sun is actually shining, and we're just a month closer to reaching summer are all things that make me smile, and hopefully they make you happy too. Hopefully everyone has something awesome planned for their weekend.  I'm having the Fried Chicken Dinner at Momofuku Noodle Bar, and I am SO SO SO excited about it.  I've been wanting to go for the longest time, and the fact that I finally, through sheer luck and persistence, managed to get a reservation at a normal dinner hour.  The trick is, in case anyone is interested, is to literally be sitting in front of your computer at 9:59 AM and keep hitting refresh until reservations open at 10, and then click as fast as you can.  It's nothing revolutionary, but it worked.  In addition to my Momofuku adventure, my sister is coming home from college for the weekend, and we have planned to have a muffin and pancake extravaganza.  Muffins, pancakes, fried chicken, and Momofuku desserts are some of my favorite things ever, so this weekend is looking like it will be something really, really great. 

If you're still figuring out how to make your weekend into something really great, I have a really good suggestion for you.  This weekend is supposed to be BEAUTIFUL out (at least Saturday in New York is), so why not plan an easy casual picnic and whip up some Double Berry Crumb Bars for dessert?  I have loved the idea of picnic meals for as long as I can remember, and I'm going to make sure I have as many picnic outings as I can during what's left of spring and all of summer.  They're so relaxed and casual, and there's something so great about enjoying a meal outside under a nice breeze.  Picnic meals require special foods that are easy to transport and easy to serve, and bar cookies are one of those items that fully satisfy both requirements.  Brownies, blondies, and lemon squares are classic bar cookie favorites, but I wanted something different that really screamed, "SPRING IS HERE!"  There's no better bar cookie for the job than one that is really just a berry crumble pie in disguise.  I'm talking about a bar cookie with a buttery shortbread crust, a juicy and fruity center layer, and a sweet, buttery crumb topping.  Hungry yet?  I sure am!

Blueberry and Peach Yogurt Buttermilk Pancakes

Hello, and happy weekend!  I hope everyone has some kind of fun weekend plans in store for themselves.  I know that I'm going to be spending some quality time with my ice cream machine this weekend.  I have big plans for it, and you guys should all start getting excited for them, trust me.  But, until that time comes, I have another recipe that should get everyone equally excited.  Blueberry and Peach Yogurt Buttermilk Pancakes.  I made these for breakfast last Saturday morning, and I think they are officially going onto my list of favorite weekend breakfast items.  

During the week, I usually have a very simple, uncomplicated breakfast that I can prepare really quickly before rushing off to the train every morning before work.  Breakfast usually consists of a small glass of orange juice (I have to have this at breakfast everyday; the same way some people need their morning cup of coffee to function, I need my orange juice) and an egg white omelette with turkey bacon.  It's quick to make and packs a good amount of protein.  If I want to switch up my breakfast routine a little, I'll have some oats mixed with egg whites, berries and honey (adding egg whites to oatmeal sounds kinda weird, but it actually makes the oats really creamy and delicious) along with my glass of orange juice.  On weekends, though, I usually like to make myself something a little more elaborate.  Waffles, French toast, and fancier omelettes are usually what I go for on weekends, with pancakes being at the top of the list for both me and my sister.  We're just pancake-obsessed.  There's few things that are better than a tall stack of warm pancakes, topped with butter, fresh fruit, and a nice helping of syrup, right? 

Red, White, and Blueberry Profiteroles

The Fourth of July is tomorrow, weeee!  I'm going to a barbecue with some of my friends in the afternoon, and then going to see some fireworks action at night, and I'm super excited, if the "weeee" at the beginning wasn't a hint. I'm ready for some serious hot dog/hamburger/potato salad/pasta salad action, followed by some pie and vanilla ice cream, and hopefully some old fashioned s'mores.  It's gonna be a gooood day, provided that it doesn't rain! Everyone, cross your fingers and toes, please. 

In honor of the upcoming holiday, I'm sure you've noticed the Fourth of July-appropriate desserts that I have posted in the past few days (and if you haven't, I'll make it easy for you: click here for some red, white, and blue velvet whoopie pies, and click here for a classic cherry pie.  You're welcome!).  Both of those desserts were good old American classics, but, I did want to throw in something that was equally delicious and appropriate for a Fourth of July barbecue, but also something a bit more unconventional.  Enter red, white, and blueberry profiteroles!

Profiteroles may sound fancy and annoyingly complicated to make, but I promise you, they're anything but that! A profiterole is simply a cream puff that's been filled with a scoop of ice cream instead of pastry cream/whipped cream, and then drizzled with chocolate sauce.  Since it is the Fourth of July though, I decided to swap out the chocolate sauce for some fresh blueberry and raspberry sauces, in order to keep the color scheme going to some degree.  I thought that profiteroles would be a perfect option for a barbecue, as the puffs themselves are really not difficult to make, and everything can be made and assembled in advance.  All you'll have to do when you're ready to serve them is take them out of the freezer for a few minutes and pour some of the berry sauce on top, and dessert is done!

Strawberry and Blueberry Hand Pies

Things are a bit weird around here. For starters, I'm bundled up in my fuzziest sweatpants and hoodie and am sitting underneath a mountain of fuzzy blankets as I'm writing this.  The weather has been crazy these past couple of days, and it's been cold and then hot, and then super rainy and super windy, and then suddenly, it's a perfectly calm day, only to be interrupted ten minutes later by gray skies and heavy wind.  I don't know what's going on with the weather, but what I do know is that it's brought out all the pollen in the world, and I'm dying because of it.  Sheesh, two days of not taking my allergy medicine because it was packed away while I was packing up all my belongings to move back home from school has left me in a serious funk.  My allergies are driving me nuts, and wait....move back home from school?  

Yep.  I'm home for good.  

It's so crazy to think that I'm actually finished with college.  I don't think it's really sunk in yet, because it just feels like I'm home for summer vacation right now, but I know that sooner or later, it's going to really hit me.  I'm both happy and sad about finishing my time at Columbia- I know that it was a huge accomplishment to get to this point, but at the same time, I feel like a huge part of my life is just missing right now.  Leaving campus for the last time on Thursday morning felt so indescribably strange, because I knew that there would be no "next year."  Nevertheless, as bittersweet as this time is, I know that I've gained so much from my time at Columbia, and I'm so excited to see what comes next!  

Blueberry Pie

It happened again this weekend...the amazing blueberry sale at the supermarket came back.  Last year, the sale was offering blueberries at 99 cents a pint.  This year, you could buy a case of 6 pints for $7.00.  Maybe not as good as last year, but whatever...this sale was still pretty legit, and I made sure to take full advantage of it.  My love for fresh blueberries is just too much to let something like this pass by.  I think I bought two cases on Sunday. I think my mom went back and bought a couple more cases this week.  That's a lot of blueberries. Here's the sad part though...we don't really have that many left...

 

You'd think that buying tons and tons of blueberries like we did would ensure that they would last quite some time, but you'd actually be wrong.  My sister and I kind of just...ate them.  We ate SO many.  I didn't even get to freeze any of them!  What is wrong with me!  What am I going to do later in the year when there are no fresh blueberries to be found!?  Thank goodness for rainchecks...phew!  I still have a chance to get some more berries, and I promise to stick those straight in the freezer and store them for later in the year.  But until I get myself to the supermarket to do that, let me tell you what I did with the berries that I was able to restrain myself from eating straight out of the container.  I made a fresh blueberry pie! 

Lemon Ricotta Pancakes with Blueberry Sauce

Breakfast foods are really starting to grow on me.  Remember way back, several months ago, where my New Year's resolutions were to get back in shape and eat breakfast everyday?  I'm happy to say that both of these resolutions have been kept!  Exercise and breakfast are still a part of my daily routine, which is a really, really good thing.  Especially when my breakfast food changes a bit from my normal everyday breakfast of scrambled eggs and fruit, to something a bit more exciting, like Belgian Waffles or pancakes.  Regular buttermilk pancakes are good and all, but they can become a routine choice.  I mean, if the idea is to diverge from the normal and everyday breakfast menu, I'm definitely going to get a little more creative when whipping up stack of pancakes, that's for sure!

Pavlova with Mixed Fruit

If there is one thing that I really, really, REALLY hate doing is unpacking.  I really just can't stand it.  I spent so much time today unpacking, it was ridiculous.  Yes, I know I moved home on Friday, and that it's been several days past that already, but I just didn't "get around" to unpacking until now.  I haven't even been busy doing very much of anything.  I've been doing a lot of nothing and a lot of Mad Men-watching, so there really just hasn't been any time left to unpack.  I've just been too caught up with other things. 

Ok, ok, ok.  Clearly the things that I have been doing instead of packing are clearly not that important.  I mean, doing nothing is actually doing "nothing," and watching Mad Men, while fun and a good way to spend time, is not exactly the most productive way I could be spending my days.  My priorities may seem to be out of place, but I think it's ok.  Just give me like a week to chill and do nothing post-final exams, and then I'll get back into super-productive mode...or I'll attempt it at least.  Take today for instance.  It may have taken me eight hours to unpack and put away two suitcases full of clothes (one of which was half full with puffy winter jackets), which seems like an unreasonable amount of time for accomplishing that sort of task, but it's ok.  My closet is unbelievably organized, with clothes sorted according to type and color coded, and my shoes neatly arranged in rows along the bottom.  My closet, in short, looks beautiful.  It was an eight hours well spent. 

Breakfast Quinoa with Almonds and Mixed Berries

It's that time of year again when I write "ok, time for a short and easy post."  The time has come where I am beginning to get swamped with projects, papers, and other random work that somehow needs to get done.  If eating, exercise, and sleep can also be thrown into that mix and done at some point in my life, then I would think that I've done a pretty good job.  If not, then that's just life...sigh.  It's crazy to think that the semester is almost over, but it really is!  Classes end in two and a half weeks, and I'll be done with finals and back at home in exactly a month from today.  I can't wait!  But for right now, I'm going to have to get back to the present and finish writing this up, feeling super sleepy after my third legitimate all-nighter since Sunday, and feeling kind of hungry since I chose to sleep for a half hour instead of getting something for breakfast.   I wish I had some breakfast quinoa right about now...

Browned Butter Blueberry Crumb Muffins

Remember way back in the day, back in the really early days of this blog when I made a Blueberry Buttermilk Cake?  It was around that time of the summer when my mom and I went a bit insane and nearly cleared out the produce section of our supermarket of blueberries, since they were at the amazing price of only 99 cents a pint.  I used some of the blueberries I bought while they were still fresh, I ate maybe about another pint entirely by myself, and I froze the rest.  There was one afternoon last summer where my freezer was literally full of trays of blueberries being flash frozen before I transferred them into large freezer-safe bags. Having these frozen blueberries on hand has been such a huge advantage; I've used them countless times since, and I still have about another two bags of blueberries left!  I made some pretty awesome blueberry muffins with them.  

Baked Oatmeal with Blueberries and Bananas

I am not a breakfast person.  Truly, I'm not.  That's not to say that I don't love sitting down to a plate of Belgian waffles, or a nice stack of pancakes, or even grabbing a bagel with cream cheese every now and then before class.  I just don't like eating in the morning.  I'm not really sure why; I'm just never hungry in the morning I suppose.  I do need a glass or orange juice though, that's just non-negotiable. There's that whole cliché argument that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and I'm not about to dispute that.  I'm sure breakfast really is very important and if I ate breakfast more often, I'm sure I would have more energy during the day, or whatever those eating-breakfast-on-a-daily-basis benefits are.  I'm going to give it a shot this year though.  This is resolution #1.

Mixed Berry "Tiramisu"

Tiramisu is one of those desserts that I had to grow into.  I never really appreciated its coffee flavor, as I have never really liked coffee, and still don’t, so it just wasn’t a dessert that excited me, or that I ever wanted to have. 

Fortunately, I grew out of that phase, and tiramisu is one of my favorite desserts.  It’s so creamy and rich, and the flavors are simply delicious.  Even that silly coffee flavor.

This is obviously not a traditional tiramisu.  Sorry if I have been leading you on.

Blueberry and White Chocolate Scones

I really like scones. Like…I really just like scones.  They’re so simple, and not fussy.  They’re just scones.  Simple and uncomplicated…perfect for breakfast.  A plain old raisin scone served warm with a little bit of butter seems like such a perfect way to begin an uncomplicated and carefree day.

I was clearly just not in that frame of mind when I made these scones.  Replace the raisins with blueberries for more excitement and add white chocolate chunks for a more decadent feel and you have yourself quite a special scone…mmm, so good.  They’re slightly fussy without being overly pretentious, so this recipe worked for me.  I wanted to be just a bit more adventurous for breakfast, and these scones did the trick.