Strawberry Citrus Shortcakes
We often get a hankering for these Strawberry Citrus Shortcakes after a long day of house projects. These rustic shortcakes have a lightly sweetened biscuit-like crumb, enlivened by citrus, with a craggy sugar top and subtle crunch of cornmeal. I made these Strawberry Citrus Shortcakes for weeknight guests with our first of the season local strawberries from our CSA. A beautiful way to showcase these delicate berries. This recipe is adapted, although only barely, from Cory Schreiber and Julie Richardson's fantastic cookbook Rustic Fruit Desserts.
Yield: serves 8 large portions
Ingredients:
Shortcakes:
- 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
- 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 cup yellow cornmeal
- 2/3 cup sugar + 1/3 to top shortcakes
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 1/2 cups heavy cream
- 4 teaspoons lemon zest (about 1 lemon)
- 4 teaspoons orange zest (about 1 orange)
Strawberries:
- 2 pints ripe strawberries, hulled and halved
- 2 tablespoons sugar
- 2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
Garnish:
- Fresh whipped cream or slightly sweetened creme fraiche
Steps:
- Preheat oven to 350. Prepare a large baking sheet, cover with a silicon baking mat, parchment paper or buttered pan.
- Prepare the strawberries by mixing gently in a bowl with the sugar and lemon juice. Allow the strawberries to sit and macerate while you make the shortcakes.
- In a large bowl, combine the shortcake dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, cornmeal, 2/3 cup sugar and salt).
- Add the cream, lemon zest, and orange zest to the dry shortcake ingredients and stir until the shortcake mixture just holds together.
- Form the dough into a ball and knead it a few times until it forms a cohesive mass. Minimal handling of the dough at this stage will produce the best and most tender results.
- Using a pastry cutter or knife, cut the dough into 8 similar sized portions. Roll each portion into a ball and dip in the remaining 1/3 cup of sugar and place, sugared side up on the prepared baking sheet.
- Bake for 22-27 minutes, until lightly golden and baked through (a toothpick should come out clean from the middle). Ours typically take about 26 minutes. Cool briefly and then gently cut open, smear with fresh whipped cream, top with strawberries and their juice and dive in!
Buttermilk Popovers with Quick Strawberry Jam
For my father's family, Christmas Eve, Heiliger Abend, is the heart of Christmas. It is a magical dark and cold night, where old hymns are sung by memory in German, acapella, by candlelight. My sister and I would look forward to the special appearance of traditional Christmas sweet and savory foods made by my Oma for Christmas Eve snacking. For Heiliger Abend this year, our young family of three is once again together. We will start new traditions as a family, and borrow from the past. Tonight we will be making my Oma's roast meat filled pastries, fleisch pieroshki with pickles. As a nod to our ravenous little eater's current favorite breakfast, will crank up the oven Christmas morning to make a batch of these airy buttermilk popovers with homemade strawberry jam, before an afternoon Christmas feast with our family. We will be thinking of our family and friends far away this Christmas as we celebrate, Merry Christmas! This recipe is inspired by Jenny Rosenstrach and adapted from King Arthur Flour.
Strawberry Rhubarb Baked Oatmeal
Mornings around our house typically involve a lot of bleary-eyed animal wrangling with infrequent interludes of serene calm involving both breakfast and the news. Last week, Paul upped the ante when he started classes for his second Masters degree, this one in Public Health. Between full time work, a 2 hour commute each day and now evening classes, we needed a new weekday breakfast strategy. Enter Strawberry Rhubarb Baked Oatmeal in jars. In this smartly conceived dish, Strawberry Rhubarb Baked Oatmeal is cleverly baked up in small canning jars, which, when cooled, can be lidded and refrigerated for up to a week for later reheating. This is a winner breakfast that we warm-up in the morning with a dash of milk, perfect for eating on the go. For those of you who are unfamiliar with baked oatmeal, it is somewhere between a less sweet fruit crisp and porridge (oatmeal) and thanks to being chock full of whole grains and nuts, it makes for a substantial breakfast. We found the addition of strawberry and rhubarb at the bottom of the jar to be a good incentive to keep digging into our baked oatmeal. Warmly spiced with cinnamon and orange, Strawberry Rhubarb Baked Oatmeal is a filling, healthy, and make-ahead way to tackle morning meals for busy week-days.
Roasted Strawberry Buttermilk Milkshakes
Hello Spring, let’s milkshake! We’re feeling pretty chipper this week with balmy breezes and glimpses of sun, and we thought we'd celebrate the changing of the seasons with Roasted Strawberry Buttermilk Milkshakes. To make these ridiculously good milkshakes, we roasted strawberries to concentrate their rich sweetness, and boosted the flavor with tangy buttermilk. Feeling like spring cooking? Try our Roasted Asparagus with Lemon, our decadent Hazelnut Tart with Fresh Strawberries, a light Herb Potato Salad or make-ahead Strawberry Rhubarb Baked Oatmeal.
Our Roasted Strawberry Buttermilk Milkshakes recipe is also featured this week by our friends at The Food Tasters!
Strawberry Rhubarb Shortcakes
The mercury is rising, and the days are lengthening. It is the season of backyard barbecues and farmers markets. We find ourselves craving Strawberry Shortcakes this time of year, and wanted to remake this classic dessert to feature the seasonal bounty. To highlight the first stalks of rhubarb and early strawberries, we made a tangy strawberry rhubarb sauce, sweetened with handfuls of fresh strawberries. For shortcakes with bright flavor and fantastic crunch, we mixed together a dough dotted with citrus zest and crisp cornmeal. Top these lovely Strawberry Rhubarb Shortcakes with heaps of fresh whipped cream, and your family and friends will thank you.
Roasted Strawberry Cream Scones
I am a second generation scone obsessive. My mother, the queen of scones, has always had an uncanny sense for sleuthing out the best local scones. From fruited to cheesed, griddled to dropped, from sweet to savory, buttermilk to biscuit-like, we have left no scone unturned in our quest for perfection! This Roasted Strawberry Cream Scone recipe makes a buttery, moist and creamy tasting scone that is so rich and sumptuous you might even forgo the clotted cream, butter and curd in order to gobble up each morsel while they are still warm.
