It’s July.  They’re lots of blueberries bopping around.  For myself, I was taken in by an enormous $7 carton last week.  When I looked in the fridge over the weekend and saw a mostly-full container of almost-shrively little berries staring back at me, I grabbed flour, sugar, eggs, and my favorite blueberry recipes to take matters into my own hands (literally!  ha ha). First came blueberry boy bait. It’s a thick batter baked in a 9×13 pan, perfect for breakfast–a little more crumbly and lighter than a coffeecake.  Smitten Kitchen is my favorite recipe, an old standby.

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Then I created two recipes–blueberry cupcakes with lavender frosting for a bridal shower on Sunday afternoon, and a peach-blueberry crumble stuck in the fridge for a weeknight treat (sometimes you need a specially-baked, fresh dessert on a Tuesday). For the cupcakes, I used a package of yellow cake mix, folding one cup of flour-sprinkled blueberries into the batter at the end.  After baking and cooling the batch, I made the lavender frosting, beating together: 5 Tbs. softened butter 2 cups powdered sugar 2 Tbs. lavender-infused milk (2 Tbs milk, mixed with 1 Tbs food-grade lavender flowers, left to steep in the fridge for 8 hours) Once the frosting was fluffy and airy, I topped the cupcakes and sprinkled a few more lavender flowers on top–to subtly warn eaters that there was more to the cupcake than met the eye. Crumble hardly deserves a recipe, but here’s what I did: combine 2/3 cup flour, 1 cup old-fashioned oats, 6 Tbs butter softened, 1/2 cup sugar, 1 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp baking powder, 1/4 tsp salt, in a bowl with a spoon or with your fingers. To skin the peaches, I cut an “X” in the bottom of each and dropped them in boiling water for a minute (to loosen the skins), then plucked them out and shed the skins.  I cut the fruit up and tossed it together with the rest of the blueberries in a glass baking dish, then sprinkled the crumble mix on top.  You can refrigerate it at this point till you’re ready to bake it–then pop it in the oven at 375 degrees F for about 30 minutes, till golden and bubbly.  Serve warm or room-temperature (or cold, for breakfast!).