Lemon Blueberry Pound Cake

Sender's birthday, July 26th, is smack dab in blueberry season. I baked this cake for his brit/naming, instead of the spurned Kichel of yesteryear. Seems like I am the only one in the family who really likes kichel, but everyone loved this cake. I will try to bake him one every birthday!

It is from CookingLight, slightly modified.

Pre-Sender, holding Newspaper.
Note Aunt Vivi's toes!

It makes a nice big cake - very heimish presentation.

Abba and Grandpa David at the Brit

2 c granulated sugar

1/2 cup butter (4 oz, one stick)
1/2 lb (8-oz) low-fat cream cheese or neufchatel, softened
3 large eggs
1 large egg white
3 cups all-purpose flour, divided
1 pint blueberries
1 t baking powder
1/2 t  baking soda
1/2 t  salt
1 (8-ounce) carton lemon low-fat yogurt (hard to find - you can use plain yogurt and add 1 T. lemon zest)
2 t vanilla extract
Cooking spray

1/2 cup powdered sugar
4 t lemon juice

lemon zest (thank you, Microplane!)

1. Spray a 10" tube or bundt pan well

    In 2020, I am into little cakes. I baked 12 mini-muffins, a mini-bundt, and a small     bundt. This cake rises a lot - with 4 eggs + the baking soda and baking powder.

2. Preheat oven to 350

3. Beat butter, cream cheese, and sugar at medium speed of a mixer until well-blended (about five minutes). 

4. Add eggs and egg white, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition.
5. Lightly spoon flour into medium bowl (not the mixer bowl!)
6. Take out 2 T flour and combine with the blueberries in a small bowl, and toss well.
7. Add the baking powder, baking soda, and salt to the remaining flour.
8. Add flour mixture to sugar mixture alternately with yogurt, beginning and ending with flour mixture.
9. Fold in blueberry mixture and vanilla.
10. Pour cake batter into a 10-inch tube pan (or a combination of smaller pans) . Bake at 350° for 1 hour and 15 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean.

Cool cake in pan 15 minutes; remove from pan. This cake is heavy! Combine powdered sugar and lemon juice in a small bowl; drizzle over warm cake. Sprinkle with as much zest as you like, the more the better!

Chilled Watermelon Soup

This is a beautiful color, inspired by a watermelon cucumber drink we bought on the street in Split, Croatia - such a gorgeous place.

Seedless watermelon chunks - quantity is flexible
Ginger
Mint
Lemon juice (fresh is best)
Lime juice (bottled is actually more reliable - I bought a bag of limes and they were very dry)
Salt to taste

Optional: buttermilk

The quantities on this are really flexible. A shortcut is to buy cubed, seeded watermelon.

Run it all through a blender. (The blender is better than a food processor).

Chill in a pitcher. Serve with a contrasting melon, chunked, or mint sprigs.

Adding buttermilk makes it really, really delectable.

Challah Kugel = Bread Pudding

It's 2 weeks before Passover, well into the Eat All The Food Challenge that I enjoy annually. What's left? What can we make that is appealing?

There is typically a challah or two, with a few inches consumed, in our freezer.

A bread pudding can easily be a parve kugel. I found this one online, but it had a different step, soaking the challah pieces and making them into a spongey dough. It sounded kind of gross, but I tried it and it's good!

It's really a concept rather than a recipe. Baking temperature 350.

A bowl of challah pieces, torn or cut. If you want to be fancy, trim off the crusts.
A few eggs
Oil (if this were for a dairy meal, it would be delicious with melted butter)
Apple sauce, apple chunks, raisins, whatever you like (chocolate chips for a dessert)
sugar
Lots of cinnamon
Optional: chopped/ground nuts

Grease or spray a baking dish WELL.

Moisten the bread. Let it sit for a few minutes and then drain off the excess water and squeeze/knead the wet bread into a uniform dough/glob. :-)

In a medium dish, crack a few eggs, beat and add all the other ingredients as to your preference. More sweet and it's a dessert, less sweet it's a kugel.

Mix into the bread dough. It's hard to incorporate so just stir until it's fairly uniform.

Pour into the baking dish sprinkle with cinnamon/sugar, and maybe some ground nuts.

Bake until browned, about 45 minutes.

I was sceptical but my dear husband kept scooping up serving after serving of it, at our shabbat dinner. It's good! I had the leftovers for breakfast.

It's more uniform than bread pudding.