It is blueberry picking season here in the Northwest and our bushes have not let us down. Our youngest daughter, Keepsake Collector, picked berries for hours on Monday. With a mountain of berries on hand, I want to share with you an easy blueberry syrup recipe. I try to limit my family’s intake of corn syrups. It is the primary ingredient in pancake syrup, so I started making fruit syrups with our garden’s bounty instead. We may use regular pancake syrup occasionally, but we have come to enjoy the homemade fruit syrups. Everyone that is except Mama’s Boy–he loves whip cream on pancakes!

Blueberry Syrup

Ingredients:

5 cups blueberries

1-1/2 cups sugar

1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice

Zest from one lemon

1 cup water

2 tablespoons cornstarch

1/2 cup cold water

Combine blueberries, sugar, lemon juice and lemon zest in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes. Use a potato masher to crush down the blueberries. Combine the 1/2 cup cold water and the two tablespoons cornstarch to make a slurry. Wisk the cornstarch slurry into the saucepan with the other ingredients. Simmer on low heat for 5 more minutes. Remove from heat and let cool. Once syrup is cooled pour into a serving containers. 

The recipe also freezes very well. It will make enough for a bottle of syrup now and one to freeze for later in the fall or winter. Some recipes instruct you to strain the blueberries from the syrup, making it more syrup-like, but we enjoy this hardier version.