#51 Buttermilk-Blueberry Breakfast Cake

I would just like to start this post by thanking everyone who reads this blog! It looks like I should hit 2000 views today, and considering that I've only had this blog a couple of months I consider that quite an achievement. I hope you all enjoy reading it as much as I'm enjoying writing it!

So, for my 51st blog post, I'm going to knock off yet another recipe from goal #51: Making recipes I've never made before. I'm more than halfway through the goal of trying out 30 new recipes, and this is a goal that I can see extending far beyond the original 30! I'm enjoying making new foods too much to stop.

When I was growing up blueberry muffins were a big deal. Mom hardly ever made them for breakfast, and they were usually made for a special occasion (Christmas, Easter, my birthday, etc). Blueberry pancakes were not quite as big a deal, but still a special surprise. I loved any morning that started off with something blueberry, so I was really excited to find a new blueberry breakfast item on Pinterest! Although I have altered the recipe just a little bit because I feel like it originally had way much sugar than I wanted. And, also, I substituted Splenda.

Buttermilk Blueberry Breakfast Cakeserves 6-8
1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temp
2 tsp lemon zest or more - zest from 1 large lemon
3/4 cup sugar / splenda (I used splenda)
1 egg, room temp
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp kosher salt
2 cups fresh blueberries
1/2 cup buttermilk

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Cream butter with lemon zest and sugar.
Because I am lazy, I didn't feel like zesting an actual lemon, instead I bought some California lemon peel at the store... it smelled amazing when I opened it and worked just as well (if not better!). Next time I might put even more lemon peel in... because it said I can!

Now, when it says to "cream" the ingredients, that really just means mix them with some kind of mixer (I used an handheld) so that it's all one substance... easier said than done with butter.

 Make sure that the butter is room temperature or even a little softer, otherwise large chunks of butter may fly around - and out of - your mixing bowl. I stuck the bowl into the microwave for a couple of seconds to get the butter soft enough that it "creamed" easily.

3. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until combined.
3. Toss the blueberries with 1/4 cup of flour

Basically I just stood there with a bowl full of blueberries, put the 1/4 cup of flour on them and then shook the bowl around, bouncing it in my hands until the berries were covered with flour. I did have to use a spoon, just to dig down to the ones at the bottom and make sure they were coated with flour as well.

They should look like this:

4. Whisk together the remaining flour, baking powder and salt
5. Add flour mixture to batter a little at a time, alternating with the buttermilk

This part's pretty easy. I added about a third of my flour, turned the mixer on until it was combine, added about a third of the buttermilk and turned on the mixer until it was combined, and just kept doing that until all the flour and butter milk was gone.

6. Fold in the blueberries

Folding in blueberries is surprisingly exactly what it sounds like. I used a little spoon, but a bigger wooden one would have been better. But this spoon was already dirty because I'd used it to make sure the blueberries on the bottom of the bowl were covered in flour, and I didn't feel like washing another spoon. At any rate, folding just means that you insert the spoon along the side of the bowl, dig down to the bottom of the batter and then bring the bottom up and over the blueberries - literally folding it.

It's basically just very gentle stirring, because you don't want to burst the berries.

7. Grease a 9" square baking pan with butter or coat with non-stick spray. Spread batter into pan.

It's not like brownie batter, you have to smush it down a little with your spoon because it's not going to spread out to fill the pan on its own. But it's not hard to do either. At this point the recipe I was originally using said to sprinkle more sugar on the top of the breakfast cake. I sprinkled splenda on half and none on the other half... it made absolutely no difference to the taste or anything else.

8. Bake for 35 minutes. Check with a toothpick for donness, if necessary return pan to oven for a few more minutes. Let cool at least 15 minutes before serving.

Mine didn't get all browned on the top like the pictures in the recipe I saw, but the toothpick came out clean and the top was firm, so I took it out of the oven. It was delicious... very good warm, and pretty tasty as a room-temperature leftover that I brought to work with me this morning. While it's probably not the healthiest start to the day, I did attempt to make it somewhat healthier by reducing the amount of sugar. Considering that blueberry breakfasts are usually for special occasions in my life anyway, I definitely feel like this fit the bill!

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Cream butter with lemon zest and sugar
3. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until combined.
3. Toss the blueberries with 1/4 cup of flour
4. Whisk together the remaining flour, baking powder and salt
5. Add flour mixture to batter a little at a time, alternating with the buttermilk
6. Fold in the blueberries
7. Grease a 9" square baking pan with butter or coat with non-stick spray. Spread batter into pan. Bake for 35 minutes. Check with a toothpick for donness, if necessary return pan to oven for a few more minutes. Let cool at least 15 minutes before serving.