You may equate summer with barbecues and the beach, but to us, warmer weather is also a signifier of blueberry season. They're at their peak between May and August—while we love to eat them plain and picked fresh, we also like to turn them into jams (such as Gabriel Rucker's Blueberry-Beaujolais Jam recipe), pile them into tarts and pies, and even make them into a glaze for ribs. (Trust us on that one.) Read on for those recipes, and more blueberry recipes we love.
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Free-Form Blueberry Tart
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Jeremy Sewall adds a little candied ginger to the tart's crust for a hint of spice; feel free to add more or omit it altogether.
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Kohlrabi, Fennel, and Blueberry Salad
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Kohlrabi tastes a lot like a broccoli stem, but it's milder and sweeter and the texture is crisper. Chef Stephanie Izard thinks it's an underappreciated vegetable, so she makes it the star of her delicious salad, served raw in very thin slices. In fact, she likes the dish so much that she takes some home to eat on the couch after service a few times a week.
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Blueberry-Banana Pancakes
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Tyler Florence made these pancakes at home one weekend morning with his son Hayden. They're a slight variation on a recipe from his book, Tyler Florence Family Meal.
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Blueberry-Glazed Ribs
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Blueberry glaze makes the edges on these ribs nice and sticky.
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Blueberry Muffins with Crumb Topping
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You can easily replace the blueberries with other kinds of fresh fruit, such as raspberries or peaches (chopped into small pieces). In the off-season you can use IQF (individually quick-frozen) fruit; there's no need to thaw.
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Perfect Blueberry Syrup
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A huge virtue of homemade syrup is that, unlike the store-bought kind, it can taste much more like fruit than sugar. This blueberry syrup will last long enough to give as gifts during the holidays; simply transfer it into tall, pretty bottles using a funnel and store it in the refrigerator.
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Lemon-Blueberry Cheesecake Parfaits
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The three components in these parfaits — the creamy, tangy cheesecake custard, the crunchy cornmeal shortbread and the fresh blueberry compote — are fantastic together, but each can be used in lots of other ways. Try the custard with any fresh fruit, serve the shortbread with sorbet or drizzle the compote over ice cream.
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Blue-Barb Jam
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Instead of strawberries, fresh blueberries are paired with rhubarb in this incredibly simple and delicious sweet-tart jam.
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Summer Berry Clafoutis
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This flourless dessert is more like a delicate custard with fruit than like the usual sturdy country clafoutis.
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Berry Ice Cream Pie
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This recipe turns out a berry ice cream pie that is as beautiful as it is deliciously refreshing.
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Blueberry Mousse
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Sour cream gives this blueberry mousse a wonderful, subtle tanginess.
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Ricotta Pancakes with Blueberries
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Adding fresh ricotta to the batter makes these pancakes incredibly moist and light.
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Very Blueberry Smoothie
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This wonderful smoothie is for blueberry lovers or for when you have an abundance of summer berries.
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Blueberry Pie with Rye Crust
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This sensational blueberry pie has small circles cut out of the rye crust, which not only looks dramatic but also allows moisture to evaporate from the fruit filling as it cooks, deepening the flavor.
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Crispy Blueberry Cookies Dipped in Chocolate
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Sweet, dried blueberries are baked within these thin and chewy butterless cookies. They're incredibly craveable and simple to make.
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Blueberry Baked Quinoa and Oatmeal
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Blueberries are great on top of baked quinoa with steel-cut oats. They're even better cooked inside. You can't go wrong with fresh or frozen blueberries.
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Brown Sugar Cake with Ricotta and Blueberries
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Chef Joe Flamm cinched his season 15 Top Chef win with this simple brown sugar cake, which he learned to make from the late pastry chef Todd Kunkleman at Stephanie Izard's Girl & the Goat in Chicago. "I just fell in love with it right away, and I've wanted it ever since," says Flamm, now executive chef of Spiaggia in Chicago. The chewy, dense confection is like a cross between a cake and a blondie. It's delicious both by itself and dressed up with Ricotta Mousse and Blueberry Sauce.
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Kolache with Blueberry Filling
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Kolache, fluffy rounds of dough with sweet or savory fillings, are originally from Central Europe, but they're popular in Texas, too. Autumn Stanford of the Brooklyn Kolache Company suggests keeping the dough on the sticky side when you mix it. The dough will become less tacky as it rises, and the extra moisture will keep the pastry from becoming too dry.
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St. Louis-Style Cheesecake with Blueberries
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An unfussy, delicious summer dessert, this cheesecake is even better with a pile of fresh berries on top.
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