Top Blueberry Recipes with Eastern European Flair

This easy cake recipe is made in a 13x9-inch pan and is so moist, it will keep for several days. Change things up a bit with any other whole berry like raspberries, blackberries, gooseberries, pitted sour cherries and, in the fall, cranberries!

Summer puddings are popular across the board in Europe, not only for their flavor but because they are a no-bake dessert. They make good use of leftover breads like hoska and let ripe summer fruits take center stage. This Blueberry Summer Pudding can be made in a 1-quart mold, but individual ramekins look so much prettier.

In Ukraine, filled dumplings are known as varenyky. When the dough is made with yeast and the dumpling is baked, it's called a pirohy.

This blueberry blintz recipe is common throughout Eastern Europe. It starts with a thin, unleavened, crepe-like pancake that can be made with various flours and is folded around a blueberry filling. Here's more about Eastern European blintzes.

The word "dumpling" used in this context is a little misleading. This sweet biscuit topping is similar to the savory biscuit topping or "dumplings" on stew. The result is a variation of cobbler or a one-pan shortcake. Any fruit can be used and this is especially good with blueberries, peaches or apples, but my mother always used strawberries and I like it that way best.

This Blueberry Almond Sour Cream Cake recipe uses three ingredients beloved by Eastern Europeans -- wild blueberries, almonds and sour cream. Their combination results in a moist cake that is equally at home for breakfast or brunch as it is for tea or a fancy dinner finale.

Polish blueberry cordial is so pretty in the glass but, beware, this benign-looking drink packs a wallop. Make it now for drinking by Christmas.

Polish blueberry soup - zupa borowkowy - is a refreshing summer soup that can be eaten cold, warm or at room temperature. Although today it has become a "gourmet" offering, it has its roots with Polish farmers who ate it cold as a thirst-quenching lunch when coming in from the fields.

When summer gives up its bounty of fresh fruit, preserve that sun-kissed flavor in brandy to be enjoyed on ice cream or pound cake year-round. Brandied fruit makes an excellent item for an edible gift basket. But it takes at least one month for the fruit to be at its inebriated best (longer is better!), so keep that in mind when making for gift-giving. Start in July for Christmas!

This Polish blueberry sorbet -- lody borowkowy -- is more like a granita or fruit ice than a true sorbet, because the texture is somewhat granular. The beauty of this dessert is it can be churned in an ice cream maker OR frozen in the freezer, and it's egg- and dairy-free, allowing the true blueberry flavor to come shining through.

The universal Czechoslovakian cake, called Bublanina, varies with the season and the fruit that is available. It's a bit like a coffeecake in texture and is probably why it is sometimes served as a breakfast pastry. Commonly used fruits are sweet cherries, tart cherries, plums, nectarines, apricots, strawberries and blueberries, which I used in this version.