blueberries – Sheryl Kirby

CSA programs have worked for vegetables, cheese and meat-producers… why not a brewery? And if it happens to help the environment by allowing said brewery to add solar panels and reduce their hydro usage, all the better. Plus, the prospect of of some great one-off beers for the next three years is icing on the cake. [Toronto Sun]

It’s free Slurpee day at 7-11’s everywhere (get it? July 11? 7-11?). Before you go, know how the brain freeze you are about to experience really happens. [Food Republic]

If you didn’t pick serviceberries last week, you might be out of luck now, the heat has turned them into raisins that are only good for the birds. My friend Charlotte and her daughter Maggie went serviceberry picking for the first time this year and have a great story to tell about it. [Not Far From the Tree]

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, but when everyone’s still half asleep, it helps to keep things simple. [Well Preserved]

Continue reading “Lucky Dip – Monday, July 11th, 2011”

Here in the city, we’re lucky enough to have any number of markets where both wild and tame blueberries are available for a reasonable price. But for me, blueberries have the ability to make me really cranky. As a kid we’d trek off into the woods in the suburb of Halifax where I grew up, and fill huge buckets and jugs with the things to make pies and muffins and the famous Acadian blueberry grunt. Covered in mosquito bites, backs aching from bending over the low bushes and that awful feeling in the pit of the stomach caused by worrying that, at any moment, you’d come face to face with a hungry bear, picking was never really considered fun. We’d try anything we could to get out of going blueberry picking, but ultimately, at the first slice of Mom’s pie, it was all worth it.

Blueberries are native to North America and related to cranberries and bilberries. While there are a number of varieties, most are separated into either low bush or high bush types, the first being wild berries, mostly picked by hand, while high bush berries are larger, able to be harvested by machine and in a taste comparison are considered more bland than their wild cousins.

Continue reading “Market Mondays – Blueberries”