Surprise! It's Blueberry!*

*I realise that in revealing the contents of these muffins ahead of time calling them "Blueberry Surprise Muffins" becomes rather superfluous, but I like the name "Blueberry Surprise Muffins" so I'm going to go ahead and call them that because it's fun.

THINGS I LEARNED YESTERDAY

• There is something called a Boiler Emergency Switch.
• We have one.
• Ours is located just to the right of the cellar door, helpfully concealed behind a large mirror because Mum thought it was ugly.
• Our boiler repair man takes his cats on vacation with him. 
• Cleaning up a spectacularly spilled carton of grits is incredibly time consuming. 
• Those little bastard grains get EVERYWHERE. Including places you are pretty damn sure never had grits in them in the first place. Like, on the other side of the room.
• Remember in The Secret Life of Bees when Lily's father T Ray makes her kneel on grits on the kitchen floor? IT IS BASICALLY THE WORST PUNISHMENT EVER BECAUSE THAT HURTS LIKE NOTHING YOU WOULD BELIEVE.   

All I could think of yesterday, apart from how pervasive grits are on a kitchen counter, was Peter in Blueberry Land by Elsa Beskow, one of my childhood favs: 

Granted, when you go back and read it again as an adult, it's actually kind of creepy and involves giant slugs, enslaved mice, indentured squirrels, and a vaguely fascist Blueberry King with his identical and mildly cultish sons, but the overall takeaway still stands: BLUEBERRIES ARE THE BEST. 

These are not the tiny and wonderful Maine ones but they ARE from the farm down the road,
so I'm happy enough using them. And they are delicious. 

It had to be Blueberries again this week. I mean, we went to a BLUEBERRY FESTIVAL this weekend so as you can imagine what with hayrides and tractor pulls and an entire cooking station devoted to blueberry pancakes with whipped cream we both sort of lost our heads and both sort of bought about a million pints. And we threw raspberries and strawberries in there too, because, what the hell. BUT. Blueberries needed to be used. 

Once again I had the possibility of making Blueberry Cheesecake (I will do this, at some point, I will!) but I wasn't feeling it. The weather has been lovely, but on the chilly side, and it just didn't seem warm and hazy enough to justify cheesecake. I was pondering it as I lay in bed yesterday morning, listening to the soothing sound of the cat trying to break down the door from the other side, and suddenly decided that the best course of action, CLEARLY, was to take the Blueberry Topping from a Martha Stewart cheesecake recipe, make it, and shove it inside a corn muffin. 

DUH. 

I am calling these Blueberry Surprise Muffins. As stated above, the appellation is slightly redundant because a) I'm straight up telling you what the surprise is and b) you can totally see the aforementioned "surprise" because it comes through the tops and sides of the muffins. But I love the name "Blueberry Surprise Muffins", don't you? 

Yes. Yes you do. 

The corn muffin recipe is from perhaps one of the most old school Yankee cookbooks I own, Judy Gorman's Breads of New England, which even goes so far as to have been published by Yankee Magazine itself. If that's not proper New England cooking, I don't know what is. 

It practically comes with its own LLBean pullover and a bag of self-rolled oats.

BLUEBERRY SURPRISE MUFFINS

INGREDIENTS

• 3 cups blueberries
• 3/4 cups sugar
• 2 tbs butter
• 2 tbs lemon juice
• 1 tbs corn starch

Cook all of this together in a saucepan until the berries go soft and dissolve and it's bubbling nice and thickly. Martha says 4 minutes. I let mine go for closer to 10. 

And now for the muffins:

• 1 1/4 cups corn meal
• 1 1/4 cups whole wheat flour
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 3 tsp baking powder
• 3/4 tsp salt
• 1 cup milk
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1/4 cup (4 tbs) butter, melted

Whisk together corn meal, flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl. Add in the milk, beaten eggs, and melted butter and stir until it's all nicely combined. The batter will be very thick, but that's corn muffins for you. Add more milk if it needs to be slightly wetter. 

And once you've got everything ready to go . . . 

Line a muffin tin with paper cups. Spoon a small amount of batter into each one, then follow with a spoonful of the blueberry, then top it off with more batter. 

Bake them at 400 degrees for 20 - 25 minutes (I went to 30 but that's my oven and the size of the muffins) until the tops are golden and crackly. 

BEETLE NOTES

Judy Gorman knows her stuff. This is a FANTASTIC corn muffin recipe. I know that because Mum almost NEVER likes corn muffins (too dry, too wet, too sweet, eating muffins is like eating cupcakes eg stupid, the paper is dumb and peely and messy, you look stupid eating them especially standing up or in public, people always eat them for breakfast and why would you do that they're so big and sticky and how could you eat that much in the morning, etc. etc. etc.) but these, she likes. She said so. Multiple times. WINNER. From what I could gather, these are moist, crunchy, not too sweet, comforting in the extreme, and decidedly yummy. 

I switched out the all-purpose flour for whole wheat. I love a good whole wheat muffin, especially where blueberries are concerned. For the corn meal, Judy says "coarse ground" and goes so far as to call these muffins "Crunchy" in the title. Being Hillbilly Beetle, I used up the last of the regular ground cornmeal we had in the fridge, and supplemented with grits to make up the difference. (See above re: pervasiveness of grains once spilled onto your counter and pain re: kneeling on them.) 

The addition of a blueberry centre is also a HUGE WIN. Last night she had one for dessert, cooled to room temperature, and pronounced it wonderful. This morning she had one toasted in the oven, with the centre returned to gooey jammy hotness. This, I think, was pronounced "even better" but said pronouncement was delivered silently through a huge mouthful, accompanied by much eye rolling, so it's a best guess. I'm going to go with "even better" and say that the vote falls in favour of toasted.*

*LL's take note for when you get these this afternoon! If you can spare a moment, do toast them in the kitchen downstairs. 

The Blueberry Topping of previous note is actually a total win in and of itself. I have been instructed to make the same, occasionally with other berries as they come, as a spread of sorts for muffins, toast, and other warm crunchy breakfast items. We now know this because I had half a bowl of it left over, and rather than throw it out (I am a Yankee after all. I would rather cut off my own finger than waste half a bowl of blueberries.) I saved it and presented it as a butter alternative. 

From this . . . 

to this!

Reason no. 38749812 why my mother is awesome: "Butter alternative" is a singularly nonsensical statement.

So whilst I may not have been doing THIS yesterday: 

Or hanging out with this guy:

 

I was nevertheless happily ensconced in my very own Blueberry Land. 

And for the record, OUR squirrel chauffeurs get pensions, sick leave, and weekends off. 

Unlike SOME.  

It's not "Cream." It's "Creme"

There is something spectacular about the ginger/lemon combination, isn't there? I don't know whether it's the mix of warm and cool, of spice and tart, or whether it just looks so nice to have two dark biscuits sandwiching pale yellow icing. Whatever the reason, it's delicious and comforting and pleasing to the tastebud and eye, and Mum and I used to consume large quantities of Carr's Ginger Lemon Cremes back in the day.

After Rich Teas, these were the afternoon tea biscuit of choice at Beetle HQ.

Normally I open these little brain dumps by explaining how I came to decide upon this week's particular baking project. This week, I got nothing. I seriously was going to make cheesecake bars until Sunday afternoon; there is still an industrial amount of Neufchatel in the fridge. But then all of a sudden Sunday evening I was throwing together dinner in that spectacularly haphazard way you do when you have only been back from Maine a few hours and you have no food because you strategically cooked everything in your kitchen before you left so that it wouldn't go to waste and there is no way in hell you are stopping at the grocery store on your way home because you've been in the car for seven hours and your butt muscles are cramping and you are not at all emotionally equipped to shop for food let alone actually see or speak to other human beings plus you are wearing your "traveling outfit" which is designed for maximum car comfort but correspondingly minimum social acceptability and consists of a plaid jumper from the Lands End Kids uniform collection, oversize leggings from Target, and Dansko clogs and so you have to make some semblance of a meal out of the two million tomatoes you brought back with you in the car plus the four pounds of artisinal goat cheese because when you are just down the road from the College of the Atlantic and they keep their own goats you'd better BELIEVE you're going to buy all the goat cheese you can get your hands on and the only other things in your fridge are tofu dogs and soymilk and you are insanely hungry because after driving back from what feels like Canada you had to go for a run before your body jittered itself to pieces and you're out of rice cakes and so your post run carbo-inhale consisted of applesauce and baby museli because shut up it's delicious and you are really just pulling things out of cabinets and going "yeah, fine, this'll work" and thanking your lucky stars that a) your mother is very gastronomically accommodating and b) she won't judge when you eat ten hardtack and tofu dog sandwiches in a row, and I was in the middle of slicing up some of the truly most delicious tomatoes known to mankind and watching Asia Business Report and all of a sudden I went "Hey, I'll make Ginger Lemon Cremes this week" and Mum, pulling out her headphones and putting down the fourteen balsam pillows we bought because you can never have enough balsam pillows went "holy crap yes you will." 

So THAT'S how Ginger Lemon Cremes happened. 

GINGER LEMON CREMES

which I was totally going to spell "Creams" so as not to be a pretentious jerkface

but which I subsequently realised is actually totally spelled "Cremes" 

so THERE there are officially called

GINGER LEMON CREMES

The ginger cookie here is, duh, the best Ginger Cookie I know. It's Beatrice's recipe for Finnish Gingersnaps, or Suomalaiset Piparkakut. It's the same one I use at Pikkujoulu when I make 8 million Joulupukkis. It's dark, spicy, sharp, and exactly what you need if you're going to use them for sandwiches with lemon creme filling. 

INGREDIENTS

• 1/2 cup molasses
• 1/2 cup dark brown sugar
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) soft or melted butter
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 1 heaping tbs ground ginger
• 1 heaping tbs ground cinnamon
• 3 - 3 1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt

In a mixmaster, beat the molasses, brown sugar, and butter until very smooth and dark. Add the cream and beat for a bit more, then add the ginger, cinnamon, baking powder, and salt. Add the flour a cup at a time, being prepared to stop after 3 cups. The dough will be very stiff. 

Chill the dough for at least an hour. I did mine overnight this time, which I feel lets the flavours combine, but as long as it's cold when you roll it out you're good to go. 

If you are making straight Gingersnaps, roll out the dough until it's super thin (Beatrice says 1/4 inch here) They are, in that case, supposed to be super wafer-like and super crispy. I did mine slightly thicker so that they would be able to hold the lemon creme without shattering. Cut into rounds or shapes or what have you. I use a juice glass, if anyone is interested. 

Bake at 375 degrees for about 8 minutes, but check frequently because since they are dark it's hard to tell when they start to brown, and if they are really thin they take a lot less than 8 minutes. When I pulled these at 8 minutes EXACTLY they were still slightly puffy, but they hardened up as they cooled. 

So I made these yesterday. It was hot as HADES yesterday. I had to work with tiny portions of the dough and throw it back in the fridge every 10 minutes or so because it just lost the will to live all over my Roulpat. For the first chunk of dough I rolled and cut and spatula-ed like a good little Beetle, but all the rounds were misshapen and squishy because everything was slowly succumbing to heat and humidity and it wasn't pretty. What I ended up doing after that first chunk was pulling off small balls of just-out-of-fridge dough and flattening them with the aforementioned juice glass on the baking sheet. It worked much better in the end; it took much less time, the dough stayed chilled because of course I wasn't working it as much, and the rounds were more symmetrical. 

BUT ON TO THE LEMON CREME

All right. I'm sure there are lots of ways to make Lemon Creme sandwich cookie filling. I'm sure there are lots of ways that use the zest of 10 organic lemons and freshly squeezed lemon juice from lemons just picked from your orchard out back. I am sure. 

We don't have an orchard. What we DO have is a Hannaford.

My version, it must be said, belongs in a trailer park somewhere in rural West Virginia. In a kitchen with a Harley Davidson calendar from 1975 pinned to a pressboard laminate cabinet, surrounded by ruffled curtains pockmarked by Menthol Light cigarette burns. It is Hillbilly Beetle at her best and most scraptastical. It belongs on cinderblocks in the backyard with grass growing through the axles and a stray dog sleeping in the shade underneath. I'm going to share it with you because I'd like to think, dear reader, that at this point in our relationship you will refrain from judging. Or at least refrain from publicly excoriating me. 

Hillbilly Beetle Lemon Creme consists of exactly two ingredients. No measurements required. You take a box of confectioner's sugar and a jar of store bought Lemon Curd. You throw them both in the mixmaster and let it go. 

Yeehaw.

And now for the fun part. 

Mum got the first ones, the ones that had been slightly mangled, and also the ones that were slightly too crispy round the edges. 

 This did not seem to bother her.

The great thing about Hillbilly Lemon Creme is that it's THICK. It's as thick as . . . I don't know . . . I'm trying to think of a trailer park-style comparison but I can't right now. Suffice it to say that it's great to work with because it doesn't ooze out from between the cookies, even when you put a massive great dollop in there. And if you have to pick one up to move it to a carrier tin, you can just pick up the top cookie and the entire thing stays glued together. It's glue, is what I'm saying. It's delicious, delicious, diabetes-inducing glue. 

Again, because it was so hot yesterday I put these in the fridge when I was done with them, wanting them to retain some semblance of prettiness for the LL's this afternoon. Even with industrial-waste-consistency icing, I was worried that they would go all gooey and messy overnight in the kitchen. I chilled Mum's plate of ugly ones too, and through a mouthful last night she managed to get out that she liked them cold. So there you have it. 

So now, dear reader, I just have to find places for my new balsam pillows, take four more showers using all the different goatmilk soaps we bought, and continue shaking pine needles out of my socks because even almost a week later, those little buggers are still there. 

Although, truth, sunrise hiking by yourself without a map, armed with a phone with spotty coverage, four pieces of kleenex, and, crucially, Vanilla Mint chapstick . . . I kind of asked for that one. 

When Cheesecake Just Isn't Enough

I bought blueberries this weekend. I had every intention of making Blueberry Cheesecake Bars. I had even gone as far as to find, mentally smash together, and print out two recipes, and then buy things specifically for Blueberry Cheesecake Bars at the grocery store on Friday. Things which included a large (ok, industrial) amount of blueberries. But then two things happened:

1. This is the weather radar for yesterday afternoon. See that bright red bit in the middle? That is basically our house.

There was also this beauty. Do you see all that silvery stuff? THAT'S LIGHTNING.

There was a TORNADO WARNING yesterday. Now, in Massachusetts, we know Nor'easters, snowstorms, etc. We know how to fit snowpants over a Forever Lazy, how to melt ice on the front steps with boiling water and cover it with trash bags, and how to clear storm drains with a broom handle hanging out the upstairs powder room window. What we don't know necessarily, is Tornadoes. As you may imagine, the meteorologists were apoplectic with excitement. They were all up in our business with flashy bolt-of-lightning graphics, hand drawn circles that indicated EXACTLY where you would DIE INSTANTLY should you happen to be there at that moment, and (to the second) how long you had to make it to shelter before being swept out to sea / caught in a tornado and never heard from again / burnt to death. THEY BROKE INTO FAMILY FEUD, YOU GUYS. THAT'S SOME SERIOUS REPORTING. I watched with amusement from my Stairmaster, significantly (and daringly) away from a storm shelter, using an electronic device, and in a room that was below ground level. I lived to tell the tale to you now.

2. Um. WHAT THE HELL? THOR IS A WOMAN?

Now, don't get me wrong. I am TOTALLY in favour of female superheroes, equality between the sexes, blah blah blah, but . . .

FOR REAL???????????????

Marvel says it is to "broaden the appeal of the comic book character." I hate to burst their bubble and sound like an anti-feminist, but removing my boyfriend Chris Hemsworth from the Thor equation seems like the WORST POSSIBLE WAY to go about that. Anything that has "less of my boyfriend Chris Hemsworth" becomes, through sheer laws of physics and science and nature that cannot be broken, "less appealing." End of story.

There's no reason for this to be here. I just felt like google-imaging and adding it. You're welcome.

So.

After dealing with Tornadoes, imminent death by lightning, and having to console a frankly completely disconsolate my boyfriend Chris Hemsworth, I realised that the Blueberry Cheesecake I had planned was probably not going to fill the emotional needs of either me, Mum, or my Lovely Librarians this week. Cheesecake is all well and good, but when you have 24 hours that are that upsetting on a psychological level, cheesecake just feels . . . insubstantial. This called for comfort food of the highest and most comforting order. And it also called for comfort food that included blueberries because I genuinely did buy a ridiculous amount I'm not making that up.

Don Quixote is responsible for the quote "all sorrows are less with bread." This is not only brilliant but completely true. Thus, Blueberry Oatmeal Bread.

BLUEBERRY OATMEAL BREAD OF COMFORT AND STORM SURVIVAL

I literally googled "Blueberry Oatmeal Bread" and came up with a nice looking recipe, which I then of course doubled and changed based on what I had on hand.

BLUEBERRY OATMEAL BREAD, BEETLE VERSION 

INGREDIENTS

• 2 cups blueberries
• 4 cups plus 2 tbs whole wheat flour
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 4 tsp baking powder
• 2 tsp salt
• 2 cups sour cream 
• 4 eggs
• 2 sticks butter at room temperature
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 1 cup rolled or steel cut oats

In a small bowl, toss blueberries with 2 tbs of flour. This gives them a bit of traction in the batter and keeps them from all sinking to the bottom of the pans whilst baking. In another bowl whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, and oats. 

In a mixmaster, combine butter, sugar, sour cream, eggs, and vanilla extract. Add the flour mixture a bit at a time, beating well after each addition. The batter will be pretty sticky. 

Stir in the blueberries. Don't worry if they get smashed or crushed as you stir them in because they're going to explode and be all gooey and wonderful in the oven anyway so it really doesn't matter. Maybe this is only a thing that bothered ME for years. I noted it because I care. 

Scrape the batter into two greased 9 x 5 inch loaf pans and bake at 375 degrees for 55-60 minutes. The tester should come out clean but remember when you stick it in that if you hit a hot mushy blueberry they're going to be that hot for a while, so go by the "bread" part rather than the "berry." 

It is true that the smell of ANYTHING containing oats baking in the oven instantly restores your zen. In my case, this is admittedly a shred of a particle of an atom of a tiny amount of zen, but it still stands. 

Baking Oats = Everything is going to be all right. 

BEETLE NOTES AND HILLBILLY SUBSTITUTIONS

The original recipe called for Greek yoghurt, which we didn't have (which we never have because Mum prefers old school dairy yoghurt and I can't eat it regardless) and so I used the fat-free sour cream that was GOING to be in the cheescake. It came just shy of two cups, and so I added a few extra tablespoons of buttermilk to round it out. 

I used whole wheat flour because I knew that oats and blueberries could hold their own in it, and I wanted it to have a distinctly "wholesome" flavour. 

I used steel cut oats instead of rolled because . . . Surprise! We had no rolled oats! But it worked. A bit crunchier perhaps where rolled would have been chewier, but I'm a big fan of baking with steel cut, I think the resulting texture is always interesting and is perhaps more nutty than you might otherwise get. It's easy to justify the choice when that's all you've got.

From what I could tell in the turning out, slicing, and wrapping up process, this came out nicely. It's moist, dense, not too sweet (I only 1.5-ed the sugar instead of doubled) and I imagine would be good as is or toasted. As breakfast on the morning after surviving a TORNADO WATCH I think it would be delightful. Ditto afternoon tea holed up in your storm bunker waiting out the apocalypse. I'm hoping that my boyfriend Chris Hemsworth can stop crying long enough to try some, I think it will help. 

Mum tried it this morning and gave it the thumbs up. Our handyman got half a loaf this afternoon and, via voicemail, gave it the thumbs up. It's been delivered to the LL's a whole day early (sorry if this throws anyone for a loop) because tomorrow we are going to MAINE and yes I'm doing a happy MAINE DANCE as I type this. Lobster! Pine trees! Hiking with the REAL Uncle Thor! Loons! Wearing even more sweaters than normal! Did I mention lobster! 

Also, it must be said, I am going to BLUEBERRY LAND so the ones I will be baking with upon my return will be half the size of these, with twice the flavour. Perhaps it's good in the end that the cheesecake got postponed. The only question is will they make the trip down in the car, or will I eat them all between Acadia and Ashby? 

Now THAT, dear reader, is a question for the ages.