Lagniappe for Blueberry Season

with a couple of gift recipes

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Welcome to a number of new subscribers—I’m so happy to greet you on the kitchen porch. This post is a follow-up to my re-appearance last week after several weeks’ absence owing to a computer malfunction. My recipes are usually tucked behind a paywall, which helps to cover my costs developing and testing them, but this once, as an apology for my absence and a way of greeting new guests on the front porch, the recipes are free to all. But remember, if you take out a paid subscription, you will never miss a future recipe or anything else I publish for that matter.

Blueberry-Almond-Olive Oil Cake

This is a riff on a recipe that popped up in the New York Times cooking section and intrigued me by its combination of flavors from blueberries, almonds, and fresh lemon. It was a typical butter-based cake but I thought it would be so much better made with olive oil. And so it was, better and easier too. Here’s my variation:

• Butter for greasing an 8 to 9 inch loaf pan

• 1 cup (120 gms) unbleached all-purpose flour

• 1 ½ cups (200 gms) fresh blueberries, rinsed and drained

• 1 cup (95 gas) almond flour (Bob’s Red Mill is a good brand)

• 1 ½ teaspoons baking powder

• Big pinch of fine sea salt

• Big dash (about ¼ teaspoon) ground cinnamon (optional)

• Big dash (about ¼ teaspoon) ground cardamom (optional)

• 3 eggs

• 1 cup (200 gms) sugar

• ½ cup (100 gms) extra-virgin olive oil

• Zest and juice of a whole lemon (about 2 tablespoons of juice)

• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

• 1 teaspoon almond extract

• A few tablespoons of whole milk or buttermilk, if needed

• 1 1/2 cups (210 - 220 gms) blueberries (Maine wild berries preferred)

Set the oven on 350ºF./ 175-180C. Use butter to grease the bottom and sides of an 8 to 9-inch (22 cm.) loaf pan and line the bottom of the pan with parchment paper.

Add about 2 tablespoons of the flour to the rinsed, drained blueberries in a bowl and, using a fork, toss very gently to coat the berries lightly with flour. This is said to prevent the berries from sinking to the bottom of the cake pan.

Combine the remaining flour with the almond flour, baking powder, and salt, add the ground cinnamon and/or cardamom if using, and toss with a fork to mix together.

Add the eggs to a mixing bowl and beat, using a hand mixer, to a light froth. Beat in the sugar in two batches, beating until the mix is thick and syrupy. Now beat in the oil in a thin but steady stream, as if you were making mayonnaise, continuing to beat until the oil is fully amalgamated with the eggs. Add the lemon zest and juice, the vanilla extract, and the almond extract, beating or whisking them in.

Add the dry ingredients all at once and whisk or beat gently at low speed to combine. If the batter seems too heavy, add a few tablespoons of whole milk or buttermilk, whisking it in.

Now, using a rubber spatula, fold in the blueberries very gently, distributing them as much as possible uniformly throughout the batter. Turn the batter into the cake pan and transfer to the oven. Bake for 30 minutes, then turn the pan around, and bake another 25 to 30 minutes.

Blueberry ricotta pancakes

This is the only pancake recipe I use, even when blueberries are not available. Then I might add chopped apples, or a mixture of apples and walnuts. Or just leave out any addition at all. In my experience, most pancake recipes produce leaden hockey pucks that sink to the bottom of a poor victim’s stomach and lie there for the rest of the morning. In this one, the ricotta helps mightily to lift and lighten the texture, at the same time lending a slightly richer and more interesting flavor to the dough.

If the ricotta is properly made, it will be in a bath of whey which must be drained before it’s added to the batter. Do that easily, putting it in a fine-mesh sieve over a mixing bowl, letting the ricotta rest for a couple of hours or overnight. If you’re a baker, you’ll want to keep that drained whey to add to any yeast-leavened dough for bread, biscuits, or pizza.

This makes about 12 pancakes, 4 to 6 servings.

• ¾ cup (90 gms) whole wheat flour

• ¼ cup (30 gms) unbleached all-purpose flour

• 2 to 3 tablespoons sugar or less to taste

• 1 ¼ teaspoons baking powder

• Pinch of fine sea salt

• 1 cup (225 grams) well-drained ricotta

• 3 large eggs, separated

• ¾ cup (225 grams) whole milk

• Grated zest of 1 lemon

• ¾ teaspoon vanilla extract

• Unsalted butter for the griddle

• 1 1/2 to 2 cups (210 to 280) fresh Maine wild blueberries

Combine the flours, 2 tablespoons of sugar, the baking powder and salt and toss together with a fork.

In a separate bowl, combine the ricotta, egg yolks, milk, lemon zest, and vanilla and beat just to mix. Use a rubber spatula to fold the flour mixture into the batter.

In another bowl, using clean beaters, beat the egg whites until stiff, adding the remaining tablespoon of sugar about half way through. Stir about a third of the beaten whites into the batter to lighten it, then, using the spatula, fold in the rest of the egg whites. Finally, fold in the blueberries, handling gently so you don’t crush them.

Heat a griddle or skillet and smear with about a teaspoon of butter or of unflavored vegetable oil. Drop the pancake batter by 1/3 cup measures onto the hot griddle. Cook until done and golden brown on each side, turning once. Watch the heat carefully, adjusting it as the pancake cooks. Because they puff up, they may take longer to cook at a gentler heat than normal pancakes.

Serve with maple syrup if you wish or with a dollop of jam, or just with a little more butter on the top.