Blueberry Breakfast Cobbler with Grits

Blueberries, fresh or frozen, in a sweetened filling layered under a topping of grits?! Here's a breakfast or brunch treat that is sweet enough for a dessert and hearty enough to start your day. 

Make the most of what you've got is my near-daily kitchen mantra.  I was inspired to buy a canister of quick-cooking grits for a side dish, but my family didn't go for the finished product at all, and I was left with an open canister of perfectly good grits.

Aside to grits lovers:  I know grits are good--I like them! My folks now live in a place where breakfast is provided, and when grits are on the menu mom pops back up to their apartment and fetches a package of pepper jack cheese to make her grits cheesy. Apple . . . tree . . . I know!

My family members didn't spend years working across the street from the Museum of the White House of the Confederacy, however, and in addition to not loving grits these family members don't share in my love for collard greens either, so all the more for me.  Except I didn't want to eat most of a canister of grits all by myself, so I started searching for other ways to use them.  This recipe was inspired by combining this blueberry cobbler filling (that my daughter found on the internets) with this coffee cake topping (that I found on the internets). Since dessert teamwork works well in our household, my daughter prepared the filling while I prepared the topping.

The topping ended up kind of heavy for a dessert--if you're looking for a light pillowy dumpling to absorb your blueberry goodness, try the Brown Eyed Baker where we found the filling inspiration.  This was a sturdier, chewier, heartier topping, which is why I let my daughter eat a bowl for breakfast the next morning.  I know there's a ton of sugar in it, and it will never become a staple breakfast or even dessert in my home, but the combination of grits and blueberries really is tasty, so it's worth having as an option for a brunch.

For other recipes using blueberries, please see my Blueberry Recipes Collection, part of the Visual Recipe Index by Ingredient. For other dessert ideas, there's a drop down menu on the right sidebar with ideas. For more ideas using fruit, I've got a Fruit Board on Pinterest, and I share some creations on my FB page. Want to know how to Use this Blog? Click here!

Green Tomato, Pork, and White Bean Chili in a Slow Cooker

Hello, my name is Kirsten and I have a problem.

(Hello, Kirsten.)

I like to make chili using not-the-usual vegetable suspects.  It all started with this Green Tomato Garlic chili recipe a year ago.  I liked it so much I put up a couple of quarts of chopped green tomatoes in the freezer for winter chili.  Instead of making more green tomato chili, however, I veered off in a squash and beet direction with Acorn Squash, Beet, and Sweet Potato chili.  Then I used a quart of the green tomatoes for Green Tomato Bacon Jam.

This chili has cubes of pork, Great Northern beans, and my put up salsa verde.  I wanted a thick chili, so I added some grits and wow--that did it for me.  We liked this chili with a swirl of sour cream stirred into each bowl.  I bet my corn cheddar bacon muffins would be great with it.  If you're having a chili cook off, this would be a little something different.  It's easy to fix (the slow cooker does most of the work) and the flavor is wonderful.  This is also great for a work day meal--brown the pork the night before while the kitchen is still active with dinner, chill it overnight, and dump all the ingredients into the slow cooker the next morning.

Note to self--this fall, put up more quarts of chopped green tomatoes!  In fact, I think I'll put the word out with my neighbors that if they don't want their tomatoes still on the vine when the first frost is predicted, I'll be happy to come harvest.  The cool thing about green tomatoes is that they can hang out on your counter for a few days until you can process them.  What's the worst that can happen--they start to ripen?  Oh, the horrors.