Berry Season Is Shortcake Season & Thus Is the Best of All Seasons.
Ohhh those plump, beautiful, falling-off-the-vine ripe summer berries. They’re superstars, right? They almost stand alone, but a delicate touch—a perfect not-too-sweet mound of shortcake and a kiss of whipped cream—can take them to realms beyond our earthly reaches. When a winters’ worth of rain seeps into the soil and teams up with blazing summer sun to deliver fruit so perfect, so brilliantly-hued and complex in flavor, we wonder what we did to find ourselves living in a universe that could produce a food this amazing. Uh, yeah, so anyway—we like berries. And, while we love to snack on them fresh—we follow the unwritten U-Pick rule of “one for me, one for the bucket”—this simple, stunning mixed berry shortcake is the ultimate use for fresh summer berries. And our recipe, if we may say so, is the ultimate shortcake recipe.
Mixed Berry Shortcake Element #1: A Citrus-Scented Shortcake
You’ve probably eaten strawberry shortcake at some point in your life—if not, we’re so sorry—but the “shortcake” piece of the berry shortcake recipe puzzle is often a little disappointing. And we get it—it’s hard to think about anything other than berries when they’re in season. As we see it, though, in order to do justice to those gorgeous berries, you’ve got to make a really darn good shortcake. But, what is a shortcake, exactly? Well, it’s essentially a sweet biscuit—buttery, flakey, and tender. Our shortcake recipe relies on butter (and plenty of it) and buttermilk to make it truly delicious. Here’s everything you’ll need to make the shortcake:
- Flour
- Sugar
- Baking powder
- Unsalted butter
- Citrus zest
- Buttermilk
Mixed Berry Shortcake Element #2: The Berries!
Berries. We love them all. While we love a good strawberry shortcake as much as anyone, why limit yourself to just strawberries? And what—are we supposed to stop eating shortcake when strawberry season ends?! AS IF. Berries of all kinds, beginning with strawberries, start flooding our farmers markets in March (on a good year) and they’ll last well into September and (in a good year) even October. So! If you expand your shortcake horizons to include different types of berries, you’ll be able to enjoy shortcake even longer! You can use any berry you love in this recipe—you could even toss in some peach or nectarine slices, and nobody would be mad about it—but here are a few of our very favorite berries to give the shortcake treatment to:
- Boysenberries. Most likely a raspberry-blackberry hybrid (a lot of berry varieties are a bit murky in origin) that’s been around since at least the 1930s, boysenberries are insanely plump and juice-filled. Plus, if you’re u-picking, they’re one of the easiest to pick!
- Raspberries. Did you know that there are tons of varieties of raspberry out there? There are spring raspberries, fall raspberries and black raspberries and even purple raspberries, and we especially love a giant, tart variety called Tulameen raspberries. All of them are wonderful in shortcake.
- Strawberries. Of course! Just be sure to use them at the peak of their ripeness! We like to check for brilliant red insides (not white or pithy)—that always seems to promise insane sweetness and fragrance.
- Blackberries. Just like raspberries, there are a gazillion types of blackberries out there. If you find a farm in your area, it’s fun to go picking and taste the difference between the varieties! You won’t be surprised to hear, though, that we love them all—we’ve never met a ripe blackberry we didn’t want to eat.
Tools You’ll Need:
More Berry Recipes To Celebrate Summer
A Berry Good Shortcake Recipe.
Oh sheesh. We couldn’t resist a little berry pun. It’s not even a berry good one, is it? Well anyway, we hope you love this recipe and that it helps you soak up these long, lazy summer days. If you try it out, we’d love to hear about it! Snap a photo and tag us on Instagram using @themodernproper and #themodernproper. Happy eating!
