Puppy's blueberry field trip

The end of July is blueberry season in North Dakota. No, blueberries are not a cash crop here, but one of the local Hutterite families takes an air conditioned trailer to Michigan and picks a large number of blueberries to sell back to us here in North Dakota. We had to pre-order so that they knew how many to pick - we opted for 35 pounds. Shadowfax and I took a field trip up to Grafton (about a half hour North) to pick up the berries. We met my mom at the pick-up site, as she was also getting some berries for herself.

We met my mom at the pick-up site, as she was also getting some berries and then we decided to go for walk in the Grafton city park. I wished that I had remembered to take pictures of the city park, as it was quite lovely. I'd say there were 20 different flower beds, each one maintained or sponsored by a separate individual or business in town - what a good way to farm out the work of park beautification!

Anyway, when we got home, I had to get down to the business of packaging them up for freezing for the year. I had lots of freezer bags and the crates to put the berries in so that they wouldn't get squished in the freezer.

Here's a view of the berries in the box. They were in great shape - plump and yummy.

In all 35 pounds, these were the only bad berries that I identified. I may have missed a few, but we really got our money's worth in terms of not having a bunch of nasty, squished berries.

The end product. Four empty blueberry boxes and two crates full of berries.

A close up of the berries. I put approximately 2 cups of berries in each baggie.

Now they're in the freezer awaiting my beck and call. Personally, I like to eat frozen blueberries almost better than fresh ones - I really don't like them when they're at all soft and squishy. We use them in smoothies, add them to our bowl of oatmeal, or bake them in scones and coffeecake.  John prefers to microwave the frozen ones first to add to his morning yogurt and granola, while I eat a couple handfuls of berries nearly every morning for breakfast - lots of good antioxidants to start my day :)