Right now in Nova Scotia the blueberries are bursting with ripeness! Gone are the cooling days of blueberries floating in cream with a sprinkle of sugar. Now we move into baking season where we push that blueberry goodness to the edge. When I saw Cookin’ Canuck’s Spiked Blueberry Crumb Bars I just had to try them as my latest baking project. So yummy! Click here for the recipe.
You start off by combining blueberries with rum, sugar and cornstarch to make the blueberry filling.
Then you create a the “crumbs” that cover the top and the bottom of the dessert. My favourite way of adding cold butter to a pastry dough is to grate it up with a cheese grater! This recipe also calls for ginger and nutmeg…nice! It lingers in the dough very subtly. Because we have gone from extreme humidity to complete dryness, I had to add an additional egg to the crumb mixture which just was not coming together because it was too dry.
This makes a LOT of squares! The idea is you put some of the crumbs on the base, cover it with the macerated rum-soaked blueberries and then put more crumb mixture on the top:
Now that is golden brown! And delicious. Even though there is some rum in this recipe I did not find it overpowering, it just enhanced that blueberry goodness. What a perfect generous fall recipe to take to a potluck or share with family and friends. Take advantage of this late blueberry season and get the most out of that stunning blueberry flavour with these scrumptious squares. Thanks Cookin’ Canuck!
Please really want this right now. They look so good…thanks
YUM!!! this reminds me of blueberry squares my Dad used to make and I still make.
I went to school in Halfiax (Dal). Native maritimer 🙂
Those look absolutely delicious! We’ve been excited to just have some decent blueberries still around, never mind cooking them into such yumminess! What a treat.
Oh Yum! This looks awesome. I am going to have to figure out some low-sugar baking. The berries around here are spectacular!