Long before Cindy’s Bits and Pieces, there was a girl picking and peddling organic blueberries. For me, there has always been lots of good therapy picking berries. Whether I was chatting with a friend, solving life’s issues or picking in solitude listening to the birds tell you those berries are theirs. Feeling the warm summer sunshine on your back or enjoying a cooler evening picking after the sun has gone down is a pleasure. I have always enjoyed working with my hands. We are now up to 80 plus plants harvesting 115 plus gallons picked by hand each year, because there was never a vision for machines to come in and pick. This year’s crop is only about one handful due to a late freeze. Since we never know about Mother Nature, we always freeze as many as possible. We can also freeze-dry the berries which allows us to use them for years! What a revolutionary preservation of one of nature’s best antioxidants.
Cindy’s Bits and Pieces has been trying to figure out a shelf stable way to use them for years . Last year, I was able to create a shortbread cookie with the organic berries! The learning curve was finding just the right amount of freeze-dried crushed berries it would take to truly taste those berries in the cookie. It turned out it was about 10 times the amount I thought! Since the berries have been a blessing to me in so many ways , I named our shortbread cookie, Blueberry Blessings. We hope you will enjoy eating them as much as we enjoy making them!
