Scones packed with blueberries—what treats!

I’ve always loved the whole idea of scones—you feel as though you are eating an indulgent pastry, but the sweetener in these small quick breads is minimal and the health benefits (such as this one replete with blueberries) are great.

“Boo Berry Scones”, a play on the name of the fruit that’s folded into the batter, are baked on a cookie sheet after the dough has been patted out to fill the pan throughout (no rolling is necessary). The recipe instructions call for cutting the dough into triangles before it’s baked, but the triangles are not separated until afterward. I used a pizza cutter to make the slices. After the scones bake for 30 t0 35 minutes, they separate easily when they’re removed from the baking pan.

Sprinkling sugar on top of the dough (I used sugar substitute) is the final touch before these bake to a golden brown. We enjoyed them plain or with sugar-free jam.

Boo Berry Scones

2 cups flour

1 3/4 cups whole-wheat flour

1/4 cup brown sugar

4 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/3 cup margarine, cold

1 3/4 cups buttermilk, reduced fat

1 1/2 cups blueberries

1 tablespoon lemon juice

2 teaspoons lemon zest

cooking spray

1 tablespoon sugar (or sugar substitute)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. In large bowl mix flours, brown sugar, baking powder, and baking soda. Cut in margarine until mixture looks like coarse crumbs. Stir in buttermilk until moist. Fold in blueberries and lemon juice and lemon zest. Turn onto a floured surface and knead 10 times. Place dough on a 10-inch-by-15-inch baking sheet sprayed with cooking spray. Pat into a large rectangle. Cut into 16 triangles, but do not separate. Sprinkle with sugar. Bake at 375 degrees for 30 to 35 minutes or until golden brown. Makes 16 servings. (Recipe courtesy Chickasaw Nation Nutrition Services.)

See what you get when you merge standby pie recipe with healthy fruit already on hand?

I really had to see it to believe it. The Dallas Morning News recipe section featured an “add-a-fruit” idea to make old standby favorite recipes more healthy. To one of my favorite pies in all the world—chess pie–the newspaper column suggested adding one of my favorite fruit in all the world—blueberries. Much as I loved the flavors of each, I couldn’t imagine blending them.

Furthermore the blending process seemed odd. The recipe said to puree 10 ounces of frozen (you could use whole, fresh blueberries as well) blueberries and spread this layer on the bottom of a prepared pie crust. (I always have frozen ones on hand because we use them on our breakfast cereal.) Then stir up the traditional chess pie mixture (which features cornmeal and vinegar) and pour it over the blueberries. How would this work? The blueberry puree wasn’t heavy enough to stay on bottom to make a separate, distinct layer. When I poured the liquid chess-pie mixture over the blueberries, the bottom layer rose to the top. Originally I envisioned cutting into the pie that contained the blueberries as a surprise layer on the bottom. Now, from the looks of things, the blueberries would cook up indistinguishable from the chess. I prepared for a bummer and was ready to send the Dallas Morning News an email of complaint.

Was I in for a surprise? Layers did occur in the baking; however, they reversed themselves. What I retrieved from the oven after baking finished was a pie that was solid purple on top but, on carving into it, had the nice golden chess layer on the bottom. What a hoot! Both layers solidified just fine. And the flavor of the fruit on top of the chess was indescribable. The addition of a tiny sliver of sugar-free ice cream or cool whip (the merest teaspoon is all that’s needed; don’t go overboard, as I cautioned Hubby) is a crowning touch.

The email of complaint drafted in my head turned into the draft of an email of congratulations. I was so thankful for the “add-a-fruit” to old favorites for the recipe column. For the blueberry vines Hubby planted in our weekend of gardening I had high hopes. Once they spring forth with succulent berries, I have my first recipe ready for them.

Blueberry Chess Pie

1 prepared pie crust

1 (10-ounce) package frozen blueberries, thawed

1/4 cup sugar (or sugar substitute such as Splenda)

1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk (I used fat-free)

2 eggs, lightly beaten (or 1/2 cup egg substitute)

1/4 cup butter, melted

2 tablespoons vinegar

1 tablespoon cornmeal

1/4 teaspoon salt (or salt substitute)

blueberries and mint leaves (optional garnish)

sugar-free ice cream or whipped topping

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place blueberries in blender container and puree. Stir in sugar substitute. Set aside. Place blueberries in blender container and puree. Pour blueberry puree into prepared pie crust. Combine sweetened condensed milk, eggs, butter, vinegar, cornmeal, and salt. Pour over blueberry puree. Bake for 50 minutes or until knife inserted in the center emerges clean (I actually had to bake mine for 1 hour until it was fully set.) Cool completely. Garnish with berries and mint leaves if you desire. Serve with sugar-free ice cream or whipped topping if you desire. Serves 8.

Too many recipes left at the end of the fruit supply? Roadside produce stands are the answer

The old saying, "Why do I have so much month left at the end of the money?", could be applied to where we are season-wise right now.

I'm thinking (and mourning), "Why do I have so many peach recipes left at the end of my summer?"

The peaches long ago left our trees; the branches, though still green and leafy, are sadly bare of fruit and will remain that way until next June.

And yet my recipe file still brims with untried recipes that didn't get brought to life before the peach crop faded away. One of those was an all-time winner, "Peach-Blueberry Pie", which combines two of my favorite fruit in all the world. It appears in my new cookbook, Way Back in the Country Garden, but truthfully, I don't think I prepared it all last summer or maybe even the summer before. It's the absolute greatest, but yet another year was breezing by without it materializing.

Enter Ham's Orchard. Until a few weeks ago I probably was the only North Texan alive who didn't know about this fun little spot, just east of Terrell off Highway 80. A combination roadside market/fudgery/burger stand, Ham's is best-known for its many varieties of peaches produced from the massive orchard adjacent to the indoor produce stop. A few weeks beforehand my daughter and her husband had been introduced to Ham's and had suggested we take a Sunday-afternoon drive to tour it as well. I knew Ham's would have to be special to entice my daughter, who is very great with a child (did I say very?) and desperately seeks to avoid crowds, to brave Ham's crowded aisles to show us this haven of goodies.

Perhaps Ham's best draws are the fresh homemade peach ice cream and peach shakes that are wildly popular with customers, especially on extremely hot Texas summer afternoons. Other delicacies are the homemade peach cobblers and ready-prepared meals that are sold ready to be popped into the oven. On the Sunday afternoon we stopped in, customers swarmed around like bees after honey. I saw my opportunity to replenish my peach supply and give life to my "Peach-Blueberry Pie" after all.

With a small sack of some of Ham's finest tucked under my arm, I resisted the temptation for a soft-serve peach ice cream cone and instead envisioned my upcoming pie that soon would have intermingled morsels of peaches and blueberries bubbling through the squares in the lattice-topped crust. (I had a bag of blueberries left from an earlier visit to the Chickasaw Nation farmer's market, so now with the peaches I was in business.)

Happily, that dream was soon realized. Nobody we saw departing Ham's slurping peach shakes or licking peach cones on that Sunday afternoon had anything near the smiles on our faces that resulted from the first bite of my upcoming warm homemade Peach-Blueberry Pie.

Yay! I didn't have to wait another year to enjoy it after all.

Peach-Blueberry Pie

1 cup sugar (I use sugar substitute)

1/3 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/8 teaspoon ground allspice

3 cups sliced peeled fresh peaches

1 cup fresh blueberries

1 tablespoon butter (I use unsalted, not margarine)

pastry for double-crust pie (9 inches)

milk (I use skim milk)

cinnamon

a "little" extra sugar to mix with the cinnamon

In a bowl combine sugar, flour, cinnamon, and allspice. Add the peaches and blueberries; toss gently. Line pie plate with bottom crust; add the filling. Dot with butter. Top with a lattice crust. Brush crust with milk; sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar. Bake at 400 degrees for 40-45 minutes or until crust is golden brown and filing is bubbly. Cool completely. Frozen fruit may be used if it is thawed and well-drained. Serves 6-8.

Mixed berries make a wonderful showing in this unusual crustless "pie" recipe

When is a pie crust not a pie crust?

When it's the shell of an apple that cleverly acts as a holder for pie ingredients.

Just days ago I discovered a fun new recipe, the outcome of which was brimming with health and goodness but amazed me at its ability to taste like a pie without the usual flour/water/oil crust.

The secret was finding baking apples such as Granny Smith that are tart and are designed to be baked in the oven rather than merely eaten as snacks.

Our grocery happened to be running a special on its fresh shipment of blackberries, raspberries, and blueberries--the first three ingredients in the Baked Apples with Berries recipe I'd just discovered. (Thanks again to my "Celebrating a Healthy Harvest" booklet, which has recipes categorized by fresh fruits and vegetables. Each fruit or vegetable features two recipes that can be prepared with that particular produce item.)

Besides being sure to use baking rather than snacking apples, another key to this recipe is to core the apple only three-quarters of the way down rather than hollowing out the full depth of the apple. Leaving some uncored portion at the bottom retains the fruit mixture during the baking process and helps the skin serve as the "pie shell" I mentioned. The rest of the instructions appear below.

After baking this concoction for 45 minutes, the apple skin made a wonderful holder for the baked berries and then the yummy fruit and yogurt mixture that's added after baking.

We dined on our Baked Apples with Berries at dinner while they were warm from the oven and saved the remaining two stuffed apples for the next day's lunch. For lunch I ate mine cold, straight from the refrigerator--equally delicious!

Baked Apples with Berries

1 cup fresh blackberries

1 cup fresh raspberries

1 cup blueberries

4 large baking apples (I used Granny Smith), washed

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 cup low-fat vanilla yogurt

2 teaspoons honey

slivered almonds (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Core apples about three-quarters o the way through the apple. Start at the stem. Make the hole more than 1 inch wide. Place apples in baking dish that has been sprayed with cooking spray. Rinse and drain berries. Combine berries and then pack berries firmly into the opening in each apple. Set extra berries aside. Bake apples until they are soft, about 45 minutes. Divide remaining berries in half. Crush half the berries and then mix with yogurt, cinnamon, and honey. Serve apples with yogurt topping and extra berries sprinkled on top. Sprinkle slivered almonds on top if desired.