Old-Fashioned Blueberry Grunt Recipe
What a delight to read through old cookbooks and come across
The Blueberry Grunt
A grunt is one of those old desserts that never got a marketing budget. No lattice, no crimping, nothing to fuss over. Berries on the bottom, dropped biscuit dough on top, and about half an hour of not paying attention to it in the oven make this one dessert recipe worth bookmarking.
I need to tell you something right up front, because if you know grunts you’re about to be confused. This one is BAKED. A traditional grunt is steamed on the stovetop in a covered pot, and the biscuits come out pale and dumpling-soft. Mine goes in the oven, and the top comes out golden with crisp edges where the juice caught it.
Supposedly, the “grunt” comes from the biscuit dough’s sound when it cooks in the juicy berries. But maybe it comes from the happy grunts of your family as they tuck into this classic blueberry
The Grunt, The Cobbler, The Slump, and the WHAT?
After looking into old fashioned desserts this seems to be what I understand about them. Remember this, often times the same recipes had different names in different families. So if you called a cobbler a crumble, by all means carryon your family tradition. But trying to understand the differences this is what I came up with.
A grunt is sweetened berries with dropped biscuit dough on top, traditionally steamed under a lid on the stovetop, and it comes from Atlantic Canada. Typically the berry layer isn’t thickened in a grunt, just sugared. And of course there is my version, baked not cooked on a stove top.
A slump is the same dessert with a different name, used mostly in New England. If somebody tells you there’s a firm rule separating grunts from slumps, they’re telling you their family’s rule, not a law. But digging into desserts, and their names you’ll find that’s true across the board.
A cobbler is thickened berries with a topping baked in the oven, and the topping can be biscuit, batter, or something in between depending on where you are in the country AND what you grew up with.
A crisp is a summery fruit dessert with oatmeal in the streusel topping. I grew up with crisps, not crumbles, the first time I tried a crumble it took some getting used to.
A crumble is the SAME fruit filled summery recipe but without oatmeal in the topping. The oatmeal is removed and replaced with more flour. Typically everything else is the same between a crisp and a crumble.
A buckle is different from all of the above. A buckle is a cake batter with fruit stirred through it, and the surface buckles as it bakes.
So what’s on this page is, honestly, closer to a cobbler in method and a grunt in spirit. I make it in the oven, I call it a grunt because that’s what it was called when I got it, and I’ve told you exactly what it is so you can call it whatever you like.
What you need for a blueberry grunt
Luckily you don’t need a whole lot to make a grunt of any kind. Which is kind of a cool thing about old-fashioned desserts, they didn’t need a lot to make them work.
- fresh blueberries, if using frozen just add them frozen and bake them until they start to juice before adding the biscuit topping
- sugar
- cinnamon
- nutmeg
- ground cardamom optional
- lemon zest
- molasses
- flour
- baking powder
- salt
- cold butter
- milk
- egg
- mixing bowl
- 9-inch pie plate
What to serve with a grunt?
Blueberry grunt tastes best when served hot out of the oven. As it cools the berries thicken up a bit, still tasty but just a bit thicker. Top your serving with
How to Store Fruit Desserts
Fruit desserts are typically good to go covered at room temperature for about 24 hours. After that, they should go in the fridge. If your house is warm or you don’t have a cupboard to put the grunt in, then, by all means, put it in the fridge to start with.
Blueberry Grunt
Ingredients
Blueberry Filling
- 3 cups fresh blueberries
- 1/3 cup sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
- pinch ground cardamom optional
- 2 tsp lemon zest
- 1/4 cup molasses
Biscuit Topping
- 1 cup flour
- 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- pinch salt two if using unsalted butter
- 1/4 cup butter cold
- 1/3 cup milk
- 1 egg
- 2 TBSP sugar OPTIONAL sprinkled over the top of the dough if desired
Instructions
- preheat oven to 375˚
- put berries in a 9-inch pie pan
- stir the sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cardamom together, sprinkle over the berries
- drizzle the molasses over the top of the berries
- sprinkle the zest over the berries as well
- bake in the oven 5-10 minutes until the berries just start to juice
- meanwhile stir the flour, baking powder and salt together in a mixing bowl
- cut in the butter, or use your hands to rub it in until the mixture looks like fine crumbs
- when the berries just start to juice pull them out of the oven and increase the heat to 425˚
- add the milk and egg to the flour mix and stir to combine
- drop by spoonfuls over the hot berries, spread almost to the edges of the pan
- sprinkle the optional sugar over the biscuit dough if desired
- bake 20 minutes or until the top is browned and the berries are juicy
- serve hot
Notes
Nutrition
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- Old-Fashioned Blueberry Grunt Recipe
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