Blueberry Shortcake

The first time I made this dessert it was with fresh raspberries I'd picked. Let me tell you, you don't want to pick fresh raspberries yourself. I bled for that dessert. Picking raspberries is not a fun pastime. They bushes are prickly and if you're not careful you can scratch yourself up pretty badly.

Anyway, I didn't know what to do with them, so I decided to substitute raspberries in your traditional Strawberry Shortcake recipe. Only being lazy, I found the easiest no-fuss way to make a dessert that really looks great. You can basically use any fruit or a combination of fruits to make this dessert. In the freezer section I've seen them selling a mixture of strawberries, blueberries and raspberries.

I think the individual shortcakes look so much more nicer than a big cake that will start losing it's looks the moment you slice into it. I use the cake dessert cups you can purchase in your local supermarket to make the dessert. That way you do have to go to the trouble of making anything really and a really yummy looking dessert becomes pretty effortless.

All you really have to do is put three cups of fruit in a bowl with one cup of sugar and mix it up. Then you let it sit for about a half of an hour and it sweetens the fruit and make this nice syrup. Once the sugar has done its magic on the fruit, all you have to do is spoon it over the dessert cup and top with whipping cream. Voila! That's all you have to do. I don't know of any other dessert you can make that easily that looks like you did a lot to make it.

On a hot summer day, you could add a scoop of ice cream to the dessert to make a Blueberry Sundae Shortcake. You could just put a scoop of vanilla ice cream in the dessert cup then pour the blueberry syrup mixture over it and top it with some whip cream and serve your guest a unique treat. Or you can take the dessert cake out completely and just use the recipe for the fruit syrup to make up your own ice cream toppings. To the best of my knowledge, I don't think the stores sell a blueberry topping to put on top of your ice cream.

The great thing about this recipe is that it's so quick and easy to make. If you make the fruit syrup mixture up in advance, you can leave it in the refrigeration and just spoon it over the dessert cups a few moments before you serve it. Coming up with six desserts should take about five minutes time. Which also gives the dessert a fresh feel that an pie or cake that was made earlier might not have. I'd actually advise not making the desserts up in advance because the syrup will make the cake all mushy if left for a couple of hours before serving.