You may have noticed I like blueberries. They're a staple around here.

We buy this huge bag from Sam's and the girls and I love them!

If anyone finds my missing pear, let me know. I won't say who I think it is, but if someone checked out the teethmarks on my other pears, they could take a pretty good guess too.

Back to blueberries, I made these delicious bars for Shiloh's birthday brunch back in August. They're a fresh mildly sweet dessert and would also make a great addition to breakfast. {Do not ask me how many of these I've had for my actual breakfast this week.} These bars make me think of Summer with the lemon and blueberry combination.

My 2 cents worth on this recipe: These are delicious fresh, but do not seem to hold up well after that. I suggest keeping these in the fridge after you initially serve them or split the recipe in half and put in a square 8x8 if you won't be needing a whole 9x13-inch pan of these bars.

Your thighs will thank you.

Blueberry Crumb Bars

Ingredients:
1 cup white granulated sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup unsalted butter
1 egg
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
zest of two lemons
4 cups fresh or frozen blueberries
1/2 cup white sugar
3 teaspoons cornstarch

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Line a 9×13 inch pan with parchment paper and spray with nonstick cooking spray.

2. In a medium bowl, stir together 1 cup sugar, 3 cups flour, salt, lemon zest and baking powder.

3. In a small bowl, whisk the egg and vanilla together until combined.

4. Use pastry cutter or your food processor (see not below for alternative method) to blend the flour mixture with the butter and egg/vanilla mixture. Dough will be crumbly. Pat half of dough into the prepared pan. {I wished I would have done more like 2/3'rds on the bottom.}

5. In another bowl, stir together 1/2 sugar and cornstarch. Gently mix in the blueberries. Sprinkle the blueberry mixture evenly over the crust. Crumble remaining dough over the berry layer.

6. Bake in preheated oven for 45 minutes, or until top is slightly brown. {I think I should have baked mine for a little longer, so do not go by the color of mine in my photos.} Cool completely before cutting into squares.

Note: If you do not have a pastry cutter or a food processor, simply freeze your butter and use a box grated to grate the butter into the flour mixture. Use two forks or your fingers to fully incorporate.

Here's a few photos of my process...

Sprayed my parchment paper with vegetable oil non-stick cooking spray...

I have absolutely no idea if this is how you get lemon peel, but this is exactly what I do. {This is where TV and the cooking channel would come in handy I suppose.}

Ignore my crummy thumb. I always think one day I'll stop doing so many rough projects that involve getting my hands tore up. Who thinks that'll ever happen?

Again, I improvise the whole butter-in-flour-mixture-thing because I do not have a pastry cutter. Something tells me if I did a quick search on ebay, the tool would only cost me a few bucks. But I'm a cheapo and a creature of habit so I cut my butter into the flour mixture with 2 knives. Steak knives to be exact. Read the note above if you want a better method. :-)