But I digress…we have an incredibly fun dessert to make…

Something you must know about this DISH OF THE DAY: The fresh picked fruit is the real star here, but good old-fashioned buttermilk biscuits and fluffy whipped cream are tasty co-stars. Then again, a generous pour of tequila certainly doesn’t hurt! I advocate here for ¼ cup, but be liberal if you wanna. Stay hungry, my friends…

Tequila Spiked Berry Shortcakes

MAKES 12 SERVINGS

Biscuits

½ cup fresh blueberries

¾ cup buttermilk

1 egg

2 ¼ cups unbleached all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

¼ teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon table salt

½ cup granulated sugar, plus 2 tablespoons for topping

⅓ cup shortening, chilled

3 tablespoons butter

¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg

Preheat the oven to 400°.  Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Spill the blueberries onto a board. Use a serrated knife to roughly chop the berries, trapping them as they scatter off the board.

Whisk together the buttermilk and egg in a small bowl. Pour the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and ½ cup sugar into the bowl of a food processor. Pulse once or twice to combine the ingredients.  Pinch off pieces of shortening and drop them on top of the flour. Pulse the processor until the flour and shortening begin to climb up the sides of the bowl.

With the machine running, pour the buttermilk through the feed tube into the dry ingredients. The dough will clump together immediately. Stop the machine. The dough will be soft and gooey. Dump the dough out onto a well-floured board or counter top and sprinkle a little flour over the top.

Spill the berries on top of the dough. Sprinkle a little flour over the berries. Fold the blueberries into the dough, doing your best to evenly distribute them. If the dough is too wet to work with, you can work in a little more flour, but this is meant to be sticky dough.  Gently pat the dough into a rectangle about 4 x 8-inches, about ½-inch thick. Flour a 3-inch biscuit cutter and cut the dough into 12 circles re-using the scraps. Lift the biscuits onto the baking sheet. Place the baking sheet into the oven. Bake until the biscuits begin to rise and are just turning golden brown on the edges, about 10 to 12 minutes.

While the biscuits are cooking, melt the butter in a small saucepan or a microwave oven.  Stir in 2 tablespoons sugar and the nutmeg until you have a thick paste.  The sugar will not dissolve completely. Immediately brush the warm biscuits with the paste.  Cool biscuits on the pan.

————————————————————————————————————

Fruit

6 cups fresh berries (include fresh peaches or cherries or other fresh fruit))

¼ cup Tequila

1 tablespoon granulated sugar

Zest of 1 medium orange, about 1 tablespoon

2 cups heavy whipping cream

2 tablespoons confectioners’ sugar

Cut the fruit into similar size pieces. For example, cut cherries in half and strawberries into fourths. Slide the fruit into a bowl. Pour in the tequila. Stir in the sugar and orange zest. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes or overnight.

Use an electric mixer to whip the cream with 2 tablespoons confectioners’ sugar until soft peaks form.

Split the biscuits in half horizontally. Layer the shortcake as half a biscuit, a scoop of ice cream, a spoonful of fruit, more biscuit, more fruit and a big plop of whipped cream.