Hi, this is Yolanda Vanveen and in this segment we're going to talk about how to clean and serve blueberries. Blueberries are such a joy and they're only available, usually at the end of the summer, when they're ripe and so I buy as many as I can and I freeze them and I eat them until I'm just sick of them and that's almost impossible because I love them so much. So I have found the best way to keep them in the middle of winter too. When they're fresh from the market, usually they're plump and they're not dehydrated in any way. But it's the middle of winter and these are coming from California, so I found sometimes they get a little bit dehydrated. So, the first that I like to do is, these are actually, I've looked, they're from Chile, so or Chile' and it's the winter time, that's the only place in the world where they can get them right now. So, an easy way to rehydrate them, because they're just a little bit dehydrated, they're still just perfect, is just soak them in water for up to an hour. And so just by using cold cold water, and just soaking them, they rehydrate again. And a lot of times they'll be crisper and because they're cold they just taste a little bit better. But I like to leave them soaking even a half an hour or to an hour if they're really dry. And if they're really mushy, sometimes they get to the point they're kind of mushy but they're still good, then I rinse them but I don't soak them too much because they just start falling apart. But I still like to rinse them at all times just because you don't know what's on them and they've been traveling and they've been stored and it's best to rinse them. So I just soak them for a half an hour or more. And then just drain them with any type of a strainer. And then just shake all the water off that you can. And then another trick too is that if you're going to serve them and it's a hot summer day, if you put ice underneath them and you're having a party, you know they're going to be in the heat, sometimes they get really soft. But if you just put ice underneath them too, they'll stay much crisper and fresher and blueberries are really nice when they're cold, especially with ice cream and chocolate. So you can server them anyway that you want. You can add them with whip cream or a lot of times if they're a little bit tart, just by adding a little bit of brown sugar or white sugar with them, it sweetens them right up. You can honey too. Honey's always a great addition to any fruit that's kind of bitter or not really sweet. Just add a a little bit and you'll find they'll taste so much better. And you can eat them year round. You can also freeze them too. And I like to save them all summer long, freeze them and then just put them right in to cold water to defrost them and then as soon as they've melted or even frozen, they're just delicious.
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