The strawberries are here, the strawberries are here! Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE citrus fruit and my new love of Cara Cara oranges is pretty much unmatched among my friends. Halos and other clementines are one of my favorite go to seasonal fruits that are easy to carry and ready to go when you are. But berries…ermagersh those berries!
About this time of year my plates start to look very orange. I’m a UT Volunteer fan through and through but there are only so many #gobigorange meals you can eat. Eggs + cara cara = orange. Omelette + Halo = orange. Hardboiled egg + grapefruit = you guessed it. So when the colorful flavonoid packed berry beauties start filling the shelves…well I can’t keep my hands or my mouth to myself.
And bonus, according to Eat The Seasons “The ancient Roman practice of using strawberries as a natural teeth whitener is still being championed today. Josephine Fairley, author of The Ultimate Natural Beauty Book, recommends crushing a ripe strawberry with a little baking powder, brushing onto the teeth and leaving for five minutes before brushing again and rinsing.” I’m not sure I’m buying into that tidbit, but I love them so I will take any excuse I can get.
Berries of any kind are beautiful, colorful and so good for you. They are naturally sweet and blend well with desserts, salads, yogurt, you name it. But the little gems are fragile, even as much as I enjoy them I can’t eat them fast enough to not lose a few if I don’t cook them or freeze them. Last weekend I bought a huge container of both strawberries and ginormous blackberries with the goal of eating them two to three meals a day. Surely eating them that often would get me through both containers while they were still very fresh and very delectable. I was wrong…they kept growing in the container. Every time I ate two, three more appeared in their place. My husband is not a big berry eater so he wasn’t much help. Day 4 and I needed a solution, these would not be thrown away!
It’s still just nippy enough in East TN that smoothies were out of the question but not a cobbler. I mean you can eat a cobbler any time of the year right? And to keep it lower in Smart Points and easy for me to remember I decided on a 3..2..1 combo. 3 Tbsp baking mix, 2 Tbsp unsweetened almond milk and 1 tsp margarine. Even I can remember that!
3..2..1 Berry Cobbler – 4 Weight Smart Points
Ingredients:
- 3 Tbsp Trader Joe’s (or similar) Multigrain Baking & Pancake Mix
- 2 Tbsp Unsweetened Plain Almond Milk
- 1 tsp Smart Balance Light (or similar)
- 1 cup fresh berries (I used strawberries and blackberries)
- Non stick spray
- Optional 1/4 cup Halo Top Birthday Cake Ice Cream – add 1 Smart Point
- Optional 2 Tbsp So Delicious Lite Coconut Whipped Topping – add 1 Smart Point
Spray a non stick crock or oven safe mug with non stick spray. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Literally just slice and dump your fresh berries in the bottom, sprinkle on the baking mix (don’t worry about clumps), pour the almond milk over the top, and then dab little bits of the margarine around the top. It’s haphazard at best but I promise somehow it knows what to do in the oven! Bake for 35 minutes and then be VERY careful when you remove it. Please please please do not just dive in…hot berries are not good on your delicate palate.
After I let mine cool a few minutes I added 1/4 cup Halo Top Birthday Cake ice cream (+1 SP) and 2 Tbsp So Delicious Lite Whipped Topping (+1 SP) and then dared anyone to ask me if I could have it. This is almost sinfully delicious and looks so decadent with the ice cream and whip…Weight Watchers for the win!
For more great WW ideas and to share with a great group of like minded ladies (and a few guys!) please join us at If You Have an Egg…A Weight Watchers Support Group on Facebook!
For access to my Trader Joe’s Smart Points database check out my new app on both the Google Play Store and the Apple Store
Link to the Apple store is: Apple Store
Link to the Google play store is:
Google Store
