I love Winter Citrus!!

Lately, I can't get enough lemon!!!! I saw a photo of this recipe and instantly knew it was going to be breakfast the next day :) Sunday Morning Lemon Poppy Seed Pancakes...which I served with homemade Blueberry Syrup.

First, you must curdle your milk...essentially you are making buttermilk. 3/4 cup of milk with 1 TBS of vinegar and 1 TBS of lemon juice. I also added my lemon zest to this mixture because it's easier to zest a lemon before you juice it :) Let sit 10 minutes.

While the milk sat- I put 2 cups of frozen blueberries (unsweetened) in a saucepan with about 2 tsp of sugar. Cook over medium heat for about 15 minutes, until thickened. You can mash the blueberries with a wooden spoon or fork to make a smooth syrup.

To the milk mixture, add 1 egg, 2 TBS of melted butter, and 1/2 tsp of vanilla.

Stir in flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt and poppy seeds.

Heat a non-stick skillet over Medium heat with a little vegetable oil or cooking spray. I use my cookie scoop to put the batter in the pan.

Serve with the Blueberry Syrup...these were light, lemony and so delicious. I'll be making them again this week for sure! I made a total of 10 pancakes and froze extra pancakes in a ziploc between waxed paper.

What's not to love....Fresh Blueberry Oat Bars!

I was feeling uninspired for breakfast today....so I decided to bake. I consider Apple Crisp to be perfectly acceptable for breakfast, so I figured a Blueberry Oat Bar could be breakfast too. It contains oatmeal :)

I couldn't find a recipe I like for Blueberry Crisp or Bars, so I used this Raspberry Oat Bar recipe and subbed in my homemade Blueberry Jam.

You begin by pre-heating your oven to 400 degrees. Cream together 3/4 cup softened butter and 1 cup of brown sugar. I added 1/2 tsp of cinnamon and 1 tsp of vanilla to this mixture.

Gradually add in the oatmeal, flour, baking powder, and salt mixture. This will be crumbly, but hold together if you squeeze it.

Press half the mixture into a greased 9x13 casserole dish.

Top with jam leaving a little room on the edges so the jam doesn't burn. I topped mine with a few handfuls of fresh blueberries too.

Top with remaining crumble mixture. I pressed this down a bit so it would stick after baking.

Bake for about 20 minutes, until golden brown. I love how the berries were peaking through the top after baking.

Yum! This was my "super healthy" breakfast today...with a few fresh berries for good measure!

I can't be stopped...I've discovered my love for making jam!

I've been inspired this summer by all the beautiful produce in the stores and Farmer's Markets. A week or so ago, I decided to use my dad's homegrown blueberries to make jam. It was such a success, that I decided to try the same concept with strawberries!! Strawberries and Jell-o were both on sale so cheap this week, I figured I had nothing to lose!

First, I began by chopping my strawberries into itty-bitty chunks :)

I used the full container of strawberries, minus the few we had for breakfast!

I added two cups of the chopped strawberries to one sauce pan.

In a second pan, I added one cup of strawberries and one cup of blueberries to make a blended jam.

For the Strawberry jam, I added 1 1/2 tsp of sugar-free Strawberry Jell-o. For the Strawberry-Blueberry jam, I used Lemon Jell-o.

To each pan, I added 1 cup of sugar and heated over high.

Once the mixture started to boil, I cooked it for an additional 2 minutes, and then transferred to my jars.


Since I already have a jar of Blueberry jam open in my fridge, I bought the "Ball" freezer jam jars. I put them all in the fridge upside down for one hour...this keeps all the strawberries from floating to the top. I then flipped the jars and let them sit overnight in the fridge to set-up. I kept one jar of the Strawberry jam out for sampling and put the rest in the freezer. These jars are great because they lock together when you stack them!

And for breakfast, homemade biscuits with Strawberry jam- delicious!

I love homegrown blueberries!

My dad has a Christmas Tree Farm...and a little land to play around with in the summer months! He planted a blueberry bush a few years ago, and we have been enjoying loads of fresh berries every summer. This year, in addition to eating bowls full of them for breakfast, I decided to try making Blueberry Jam. I found a very simple recipe- only took about 5 minutes to make! I halved the recipe, because I am the only one that will eat the jam. The only ingredients are sugar, blueberries and lemon jell-o!
A .30 oz package of jell-o is about 3 tsp so I used 1 1/2 tsp for my recipe with 1 cup of sugar and 2 cups of blueberries. Place these ingredients in a saucepan over high heat.
After about 1 minute, the berries started to break down. I crushed a bunch of them with a fork.

After boiling for 2 minutes, the sauce started to thicken and took on the beautiful dark purple color!

I poured the mixture into two jars and stuck in the refrigerator overnight.

The finished product!

And for breakfast, a toasted Whole Wheat English Muffin smeared with this gorgeous jam! After tasting it, I know I will use about half the sugar next time. I even used sugar free jell-o, but this was pretty sweet. Very tasty!!

Dad's Blueberry Bush - covered in tons of gorgeous berries! The net is to keep the birds out.

Robyn was just picking them and eating them straight off the bush.

I am pretty sure there were only 4 blueberries in her bag after 45 minutes of picking. She ate about 70! She is my little blueberry machine :)