Sonoma County berries make great summer desserts
All over Sonoma County, the local blueberries are popping, the blackberries are drooping with ripeness and the fragrant aroma of sweet strawberries wafts from roadside patches and farmstands.
If you make pies or preserves, you’re in seventh heaven. But not everyone has the time or the desire to put up their own jams and make their own pie crust, especially when the weather is already hot and sticky.
Less labor intensive but equally satisfying are some of the fruit desserts we inherited from early American colonists and the Europeans: crisps and biscuit-topped cobblers, creamy trifles and almond-scented cakes and galettes.
At Backyard in Forestville, chef/owner Daniel Kedan and his wife, pastry chef Marianna Gardenhire, source from local farms to turn out an array of accessible yet elegant fruit desserts.
“We do very, very simple desserts,” said Kedan, who has earned a 2015 Bib Gourmand award from Michelin for being one of the best, moderately priced restaurants. “You just leave it alone, and let the ingredients shine.”
The couple sources blueberries from Sonoma Swamp Blues on Occidental Road in Sebastopol and blackberries and raspberries from the Sebastopol Berry Farm on Ross Station Road. Their strawberries come from Lao Saetern’s farmstand on Highway 12 and from Bloomfield Organics on Valley Ford Road, which also offers a u-pick adventure to the public.
“The berries from the Sebastopol Berry Farm are easy to find (at farm markets),” Kedan said. “We get marionberries (the most common blackberry cultivar) from Rainbow’s End Farm in Occidental.”
Some of the summer fruits commonly known as berries do not have much in common genetically. Many also have complicated family trees, the result of multiple hybrid experiments. Case in point: the boysenberry, which is a cross between a raspberry, blackberry, loganberry and dewberry. The deep-purple, sweet-tart boysenberry was developed in the 1920s in Napa, and later championed by farmer Walter Knott of Knott’s Berry Farm in Southern California. (Locally, you can find artisan boysenberries at Kokopelli Garden south of Sebastopol through mid-July.)
One of the easiest desserts for beginning bakers to tackle is the cobbler, which has many different variations in the U.S., including the oddly named buckle, the grump and the slump. While crisps have an oat topping, the cobbler is topped with a sweet biscuit made from butter, flour, sugar and buttermilk.
“We use ceramic loaf dishes, and we put the fruit and the lemon juice in, then top it with a biscuit, on top,” Kedan said. “We like to do it with blackberries and marionberries.”
Another popular dessert at Backyard is the Lemon Trifle, created from layers of lemon curd, berries, whipped cream and cake. The dessert is traditionally made with an Italian sponge cake, but home bakers might want to substitute an olive oil cake that’s easier to make but equally delicious.
The biggest challenge to making a trifle is creating and assembling the components for the various layers, which should meld into a sum that is greater than its parts.
“We do the trifle in an 3-ounce Mason jar, so you can see all the layers,” Kedan said. “Then we top it with candied nuts.”
Backyard also bakes a tasty financier cake that provides a perfect foil for the season’s fleeting blueberries. The brown-butter almond cake is light and moist, like a sponge cake, with a nutty flavor derived from almonds.
“It’s very easy and a great way to utilize egg whites,” Kedan said. “You put the berries inside the batter to bake.”
The cake tastes even better with a scoop of homemade ice cream, which Gardenhire likes to make with fresh strawberries and either yogurt or kefir.
“There’s no egg, so it’s really a sherbet,” she said. “A lot of strawberry ice cream tastes baked instead of fresh. With this one, you’re really getting a mouthful of strawberry.”
Up the street at Twist Eatery in Forestville, chef/owner Jeff Young has been picking blackberries from his back yard and turning them into his favorite dessert: blackberry galette with blackberry ice cream.
“Galettes are quicker and easier than pies,” Young said. “And the ice cream is about the purity of the blackberry.”
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The following four recipes are from Daniel Kedan and Marianna Gardenhire of Backyard in Forestville. “We are huge fans of anything topped with biscuits,” Kedan writes. “We love adding peach pit ice cream to give it a nutty, sweet flavor.
Marionberry Cobbler
Makes 4 servings
For Sweet Biscuit topping:
2½ cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons salt
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