Blueberries Part 2: Cooking and Baking

So last week I shared that we went blueberry picking and that we made mini blueberry pies. The post got long so I didn't share our adventures in blueberry jam making and blueberry muffin baking. So today I'm going to share those adventures. Our main reason to go blueberry picking was to make blueberry jam. We wanted some for Christmas gifts and just to enjoy ourselves. I had read the recipe in the pectin I bought that we needed five pints of blueberries (which is 2.5 quarts), so I planned on picking three quarts and we picked 3.5 since we were having so much fun.

Well after making the mini pies we started on the jam. We did the pies first so I could run the jars through the dishwasher. We followed the recipe and instructions that came with the Sure Jell. They can be found here. We started by mashing the blueberries by hand.

Hazel did not like doing this and we needed six and a half cups of mashed blueberries, so we took out the food processor. She liked this method much better and was pretty good at making sure they didn't get too pureed.

This of course went much faster as well. Then we measured the sugar. Mixed 1/4 cup with the pectin and followed the directions on the recipe that comes with the pectin. Before we started cooking I made sure my jars were all set to go and put the lids in boiling water.

By this point Hazel had lost interest and since it was all on the stove and involving rather hot temperatures I didn't care. She went off to play while I did the cooking. Needless to say there are no pictures since you need to work fast. I do not have a canner but used a large pan that has a steamer dropped into it and it worked well. The recipe said it would make 9 cups and I got 12 jars (or about 12 cups).

The next morning Hazel wanted to make blueberry muffins. I wanted to change up our normal recipe, so I did some searching. I tweaked the one I found at The Pioneer Woman.

I used three cups minus two tablespoons of whole wheat flour, one teaspoon baking soda, two teaspoons baking powder, one cup oatmeal, pinch of salt, dash of nutmeg, teaspoon of cinnamon and a half cup of sugar. Hazel mixed these for me (and helped with the measurements). Then we beat an egg, added 1/4 cup of olive oil, mashed one ripe banana, and what ended up being 1.5 to 2 cups of nonfat Greek yogurt (the recipe was dry with my additions so we kept adding more yogurt until we got a consistency we liked).  Hazel beat these with a whisk.

Then we added the dry ingredients (and adjusted with the yogurt).

Hazel started mixing it all up but it was had to do, so I took over. Then we added two cups of blueberries.

Then we stuck liners in the muffin pan and scooped it out. Hazel did the scooping and I assisted with another spoon to help get it out of her ladle.

If you plan to eat them warm, use foil liners!! Otherwise it doesn't matter. The paper ones worked fine once they were cool. We baked them according to the recipe at 385 for 20 minutes. Oh, and we got 24 cupcakes with my additions! We brought some to the children's librarian since we had Move and Groove that morning and some to my mother-in-law since Hazel went to spend time with her after Move and Groove and then I think I ended up eating most of them. They were delicious! We finished them this morning.

So that is our new recipe for blueberry cupcakes. What have you been up to with all the great summertime fruit?

This is where I share...