Lemon Poppyseed Strawberry Shortcakes! (And Strawberry Picking is Cute Too!)

We're deep into Summer and baking has slowed. Instead, I find myself combatting fruit flies that have found their home in the windowsill. I hear the humming of a wasp nest being in an unreachable part of our porch. We worry about the dogs; Murphy is allergic. We have it on our to-do list for this long weekend.

Yesterday, we canoed down the Monogahela. Wine drunk, we floated and made new friends. The rain water stirred up soot and mud and I lost track of how many rocks I skipped when we stopped to swim. And we pulled out the sofa bed and threw on a black-and-white movie and fell asleep to the orchestra of heart beats and dog pants and the air conditioner whirring in the mess of sweat and fog that is 10 o'lock in Pennsylvania.

Two weeks ago, we began this process of running away from the heat in our house and embracing it more outdoors. We went strawberry picking one Sunday. It was Nolan's idea. He's more creative in this regard, having done more things in his childhood, he can recall those times and recreate them for us now. We drove out to a town called Armagh and grabbed a cardboard box for every berry we found. We laughed and forgot about time here again, too. We stayed on the familiar path and pushed the leaves away a bit deeper. We met a collie named Rudy. We left our orange flag, the indication that a row has been picked-through, and we kissed in the sunlight. We took a two hour nap that afternoon.

We've snacked on these berries, fed on them. We've given them to our chickens and put them on a cheese plate when we wanted a light dinner. We had them with oatmeal and Pimm's and this week I'll make them the last of them into a crumble. But the first dish I made with them, my favorite for every year (as seen here, here, here, and here), was to put them in a shortcake and enjoy them as they were--some sour, some sweet, some blood red and some white. 

Lemon Poppyseed Scone "Shortcake"

Ingredients:

• 2 1/2 cup AP flour
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1 TB baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup cold butter, cubed
• 1 egg + 1 yolk (for egg wash)
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 1 TB vanilla
• Zest and juice of 1 lemon
• 2 TB poppyseeds

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400*F and prepare a sheet pan with a Silpat or parchment paper
2. In a large bowl, sift together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt
3. With clean hands, roll the butter into the flour with your fingers, creating flakes. Continue to crumble butter until fat is the size of peas
4. In a measuring cup, whisk together your egg, cream, vanilla, and lemon
5. Create a well in your dry ingredients and with a wooden spoon slowly mix while you pour your wet ingredients in
6. Continue to mix until fully incorporated and a dough comes together
7. Pat out onto a floured work surface and shape into a rectangle
8. Cut into 9 pieces and transfer onto your prepared sheet
9. Make an egg wash (1 yolk + 1 TB water) and brush onto your scones
10. Sprinkle each with poppyseeds
11. Bake for 25 minutes or until golden
12. Allow to cool while you prepare your whipped topping and strawberries

Whipped topping and preparation: In a stand mixer, whisk 1/2 cup heavy cream until soft peaks form, then add 4 oz creme fraiche (I love Vermont Creamery's), 1/2 cup confectioner's sugar, and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Beat until peaks form.

Cut a scone in half, add whipped filling and a few strawberries and enjoy!

Wild Berry Shortcake: In Partnership with Nordic Ware

My sister was supposed to swim today. She’s 6 months pregnant and hot all the time. To stretch, lay out, relax, she said it would be heaven to her. Instead, it rained, so she fell asleep on the couch, curled up in an old blanket a great-aunt made. The room is dark and the light through the lace curtains is grey. Summer is fickle and sometimes you can only lie down for an hour and wait out the storm.

This morning we talked about two uncles we had. One died in a war, the other died from smoking a pack a day. I don’t miss either anymore, really, but we live in the shadows of their totems: tan lines from mowing Tanglewood Baptist Church’s cemetery, a gold ring one wore on his pinky finger, the distrust of feminine men and women who don’t put wear makeup. We live in these totems and don’t talk of them much. My dad keeps a used shell from his brother’s 21-gun salute. My mother had a bumper sticker on her Nissan for the longest time: “All gave some, some gave all” for her brother, too.

They were uncles with nothing to do with one another, but we visited both in one day. One July in Indiana, a few days in the Midwest so we could visit our family there. We played basketball with John and picked blackberries with Mike. I remember the clouds were as curt and monosyllabic as their names. The sun was hot, no shade out in farm country. We rode our bikes to Dairy Queen and John sang “Sex and Candy” under his breath the whole way there.  I remember it because later, on the way to my uncle’s to pick berries, I said her brother said a curse word.

It stormed when we got to Mike’s. Summer is fickle and so we made dessert. He kept an old ice cream bucket in his fridge that was full of bruised berries, smashed and crammed to close the lid. We stayed there for two hours, my mother made a yellow cake. We ate it with ice cream and those bruised and bleeding berries. I remember it all so vividly, a world I was only acquainted with. One July when the summer was still fickle, too.

Wild Berry Shortcake

Inspired by my summers in Indiana and Nordic Ware's Shortcake Basket Pan. Makes 6 shortcakes or 2 8-inch square cakes.

Ingredients for Shortcakes

• 1 ¼ cup AP flour
• ½ cup corn flour or a fine-ground cornmeal
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• Pinch of salt
• ¼ cup half ‘n half
• 1 TB pure vanilla extract
• Zest and juice of 1 lemon
• 1 cup butter, softened
• 1 cup white sugar
• 5 egg

Directions for Shortcakes

1. Preheat oven to 350*F
2. Prepare your NordicWare shortcake pan with vegetable shortening and flour, as recommended by the care instructions
3. Sift together flours, baking powder, and salt four times until very airy and light. Set aside
4. Whisk together half ‘n half, vanilla, and lemon until well-mixed. Set aside.
5. In the bowl of a stand mixer, fitted with a paddle attachment, cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy
6. Add eggs, one at a time. Make sure you turn off mixer once in a while to scrape the edges and bottom with a rubber spatula. Mixture will look curdled, but it is just fine
7. With your rubber spatula (not with the stand mixer), lightly fold in flour mixture, a half-cup or so at a time
8. When all flour is incorporated, your mixture will be pretty thick. Thin it out with your milk mixture and beat for fifteen seconds with the stand mixer on medium-high to aerate slightly
9. Split batter between your 6 prepared shortcake cups
10. Bake for 24-28 minutes or until tops of cakes are golden and slightly puffed (while this is baking, make your whipped cream)
11. Allow to cool completely before removing from pan and assembling your desser

Ingredients for Cream

• 1 cup heavy whipping cream, cold
• ½ cup confectioner’s sugar
• 1 TB pure vanilla extract
• Pinch of salt
• ¼ cup crème fraiche (or  Greek yogurt)

Directions for Cream

1. While cakes are baking and cooling, work on your cream
2. In the bowl of your stand mixer, now fitted with the whisk attachment, whip your cream until soft peaks form
3. Add your vanilla and continue beating on medium
4. Slowly add your confectioner’s sugar and your pinch of salt
5. Turn mixer off
6. Gently fold in your crème fraiche or yogurt. The whipped cream will deflate slightly, but the added dairy will thicken the mixture to a nice, heavy consistency
7. Set aside until ready to assemble cake

Assembly: When cakes are cooled, top each with a couple tablespoons of your cream mixture and a few wild berries (as I did in this recipe) or blackberries (really, though, any berry will work). Sift a little more confectioner’s sugar for good measure and enjoy! 

A special thanks to Nordic Ware for sponsoring this post. Nordic Ware has been producing quality kitchenware products in their 70 years and are now one of America's most beloved and iconic brands. For more information or products, check out their website!

An Updated Strawberry Shortcake

So suddenly the old feelings come. Always when my mind stops wandering. Always when the chances come and I lose the gull to roll the dice. I’m more fearful now than I used to be, so suddenly when those feelings come. A well, an aquifer, a rain gutter. A response to gravity. A need to flow.

I remain lazy this summer, sleeping past my alarm. Hitting snooze so often, the sound harmonizes with the early birds. I fell asleep on the porch swing one morning, my coffee grew cold and so did I. I got seasick in this landlocked state. I washed my face with cold water when I woke up and found a spider in the sink.

I mowed the lawn while everyone is away. Two blisters and a callous because I don’t work often. I take care of nine cats while I’m here. We keep the gasoline in a small barn that used to house chickens, then ducks, then a wild pheasant that broke its leg. I don’t think much of those days now; the grapevine strangled what was left of the coop.

I think I used all my potential on healing these last few months. Wasted, but perhaps not squandered. Exhausted, but perhaps not exploited. I think I have a bit farther to go. I sit out and lay in the sun most days on my lunch break, trying to escape the Freon cold of air conditioner window units. I think back to a year ago, when I made my parents dessert in a house that had an outdoor kitchen. I think back to how every promise was broken within a year. I think of who I am now, if I’ve really grown at all. And I bake to combat the Freon cold of the air conditioner, too.

Victoria Sponge Strawberry Shortcake

An update on a classic with another classic. This recipe is adapted from Nigella Lawson's in How to be a Domestic Goddess. Makes one, 2-layered cake out of two 8-inch square pans.

Ingredients for the Cakes:

• 1 ¼ cup AP flour
• ½ cup almond meal
• 4 TB cornstarch
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• ¼ cup milk
• Zest of one orange
• 2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon almond extract
• 1 cup butter, softened
• 1 cup sugar
• 5 eggs

Ingredients for the Cream:

• 1 cup heavy whipping cream
• ½ cup confectioner’s sugar
• 1 TB pure vanilla extract
• Pinch of salt
• ½ cup mascarpone cheese

Directions for Cakes:

1. Preheat oven to 350*F, prepare two 8x8 square cake pans with parchment paper and butter
2. Sift together the flour, almond meal, and baking powder four times, until very airy and light. Set aside
3. In a measuring cup, whisk together milk, extracts, and zest
4. In a stand mixer, fitted with a paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy
5. Add eggs, one at a time. Turn off and scrape with a rubber spatula when all eggs are in mixture. It will look slightly lumpy and curdled, but it is just fine
6. With your rubber spatula (not with the stand mixer), lightly fold in flour mixture, a half-cup or so at a time
7. When all flour is incorporated, your mixture will be pretty thick. Thin it out with your milk mixture and beat for fifteen seconds with the stand mixer on medium-high to aerate slightly
8. Split batter in half between the two prepared pans
9. Put both pans on a half sheet and bake for 22-25 minutes, or until golden brown and sides have pulled away from the pan
10. Allow to cool

Directions for Cream:

1. While cakes are baking and cooling, work on your cream
2. In the bowl of your stand mixer, now fitted with the whisk attachment, whip your cream until soft peaks form
3. Add your vanilla and continue beating on medium
4. Slowly add your confectioner’s sugar and your pinch of salt
5. Turn mixer off
6. Gently fold in your mascarpone cheese. The whipped cream will deflate slightly, but the cheese will thicken the mixture to a nice, heavy consistency
7. Set aside until ready to assemble cakes

To assemble: Lay one layer on your work surface and dump your cream mixture into the center of the cake. Using an offset spatula and working from the center, spread your mixture toward the edges, being as rustic as you so choose. Add about 5-10 chopped strawberries on top of this and a squeeze of orange. Sit your second cake layer on top of this. Sift confectioner’s sugar on this layer and sprinkle almond slices as a finishing touch. Serve warm or allow to refrigerate for a couple hours for flavors to mellow. Best within two days.