Best huckleberry recipes for dessert you have to make in July and August when they’re fresh in the stores or you’ve gone huckleberry picking with your family! From muffins to homemade jam and how to make Huckleberry Sweet Rolls recipe is below.
Here are 9 easy huckleberry recipes for dessert you can make with this unique fruit! In the summer months we love this sweet berry in muffins, syrup, cobbler and more. For breakfast or quick and easy dessert, they’re the best add in! (affiliate links present)
Let’s start with how we started on this journey. We moved to Idaho in 2018. If you didn’t know, this is their state fruit and SO good if you’ve never tried them. I tasted my first batch when I worked with Albertsons one year. I was addicted from that day on and made a fresh fruit crisp that year.
What are the best uses for huckleberries?
The leftovers were put into pancakes, made Instant Pot jam and baked into oatmeal in the morning. This year we went huckleberry picking ourselves!! The three of us picked enough to share 3 new recipes below. They were just so good.
Huckleberry Sweet Rolls Recipe
The first thing that came to mind was to add this fruit in to make sweet rolls with huckleberries. Now we make each and every Christmas. I have how to make these below. But there had to be so many more recipes with huckleberries out there too…..
It’s said to be simple mistake actually. Mark Twain borrowed it for a character in his famous book, Huckleberry Finn.
This is a debate. Some people say that they’re really not all safe so I wouldn’t, while others eat them by the handful without issues. I would just ensure they aren’t some other type of berry. As long as they are in fact huckleberries, there shouldn’t be an issue.
They grow on short shrubs or subshrubs with simple oblong leaves. They vary from red to a deep purple shade, the darker the sweeter and riper they are.
Huckleberries grow wild on slopes, in forests, and lake basins of the Northwestern United States and Western Canada. If you lived in these areas you could plant them yourself.
We made a batch of homemade jam with our fresh berries not once but twice. We always use every single one we pick and usually have enough for a few fun huckleberry recipes at home. You can also make this huckleberry jam on your stovetop. Either way it is amazing on toast or a bagel.
What do huckleberries taste like?
If you eat them right off the bush they would be described as the taste of a mix between a pomegranate seed and a blueberry? Most of the time sugar is added in with them to make something with them. Most of the time they are used to make desserts but can be savory in a sauce over meat too.
Huckleberry Ideas
We weren’t done this year though, we had a lot to bake with!! I thought since it was already mid afternoon that a breakfast something would be great. An oatmeal and bread or muffin came to mind and I got to mixing.
- First we made a few batches of simple overnight oats with these on top.
- Then, we used our simple muffin recipe that works with any sort of fresh berry or chips.
- This is how to make homemade popsicles with these or a mixture with other berries too.
Voila, our huckleberry muffins were created and devoured that morning by the 5 of us in no time at all.
I suppose you could make a larger loaf or bundt cake out of this same batter. Personally I veer towards grab and go items and think muffins are just our thang! No more too done ends nobody wants to eat, every one is perfect. We didn’t stop there with our huckleberry recipe ideas though.
If you only have access to frozen berries you can use those instead. The best results will come if you allow them to defrost in a strainer to allow the excess juices to drain away. If you add frozen, when they defrost, the batter will have more liquid and may cause your baked goods to be a wetter texture.
Can you make cobbler with huckleberries?
Yes, and it is oh so good. If you have another fruit recipe of sorts you can just swap it out for these beauties. The previous year we made this gorgeous huckleberry cobbler recipe you can now follow yourself. If you love a thick and sweet crisp on top of fresh juicy fruit, you’ll love this one.
What can you make with fresh huckleberries?
Here are a few more to choose from that other bloggers have created. If you have a large batch you will need all the ideas you can get. Each year I like to make something new so choose which one you like best.
- Huckleberry hand pies sound good
- This is the most popular huckleberry pie recipe around
- I like this one because it’s from someone in Idaho, they just made pancakes with these fresh berries
- A huckleberry syrup recipe would be great too
Now I am going to show you how to make huckleberry sweet rolls:
Huckleberry Sweet Rolls
Time needed: 3 hours and 30 minutes
Huckleberry Dessert
- Mix ingredients
In a bowl combine 1.5 c flour and yeast, set aside. In a pan heat milk, sugar, butter and salt until 120 degrees F. Remove from burner. Once butter is melted, add flour/yeast mixture.
Put mixture in a stand mixture on low with a paddle and add eggs one at a time. Then swap out to use hook attachment.
Add remaining flour 1 cup at a time on low, then increase to medium for 3 minutes until dough forms. - Let dough rise
Grease a bowl with olive oil and put dough inside, flip over so it’s coated on both sides. Cover with dish towel and set in warm area for 1.5 hours.
Put dough on floured surface and punch down. Allow to rest for 10 minutes. - Make filling
In a bowl mix filling ingredients together.
- Prepare dough
Roll dough out on the cutting board until it is about 20″ x 10″ in size. Pour berry mixture filling on top and spread out leaving 1″ empty along the edges.
Roll up dough with fresh or frozen fruit in the middle. Seal ends.
Cut into 12 equal sized pieces and place in a 9×13″ pan sprayed with non stick spray. Leave a bit of space in between each one to rise.
- Rise
Cover and allow to rise for 40 minutes.
- Bake
Preheat oven to 350 and bake for 30-40 minutes until they’re golden brown on top. Take out and cool for 5 minutes. Melt or spread frosting on top before serving.
- Serve
Top with a bit of vanilla ice cream and lemon zest, and/or some wild huckleberries on top. Huckleberry ice cream is a treat if you can find it.
What can you make with frozen huckleberries?
If it is off season you could use frozen huckleberries instead, fresh is always best though….or better yet defrost them. Remember to bake desserts until they are just done, do not over bake them so they’re dry. If you are using these to make huckleberry muffins you’d want to toss them with a bit of flour so they don’t sink to the bottom.
For breakfast or dessert huckleberries are such an amazing fruit. Mixed inside the batter of an Instant Pot coffee cake they’re a great add in too. Did you add something else when you made these? Leave a comment below so we can try your version next time too!
Huckleberry Sweet Roll Recipe
Equipment
- 1 mixer
- 1 9×13 pan
- 1 Bowl
Ingredients
- 4 c all purpose flour
- 2 1/4 tsp active dry yeast
- 1 c milk
- 1/3 c butter, room temperature
- 1/3 c sugar
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 2 eggs, room temperature
- filling
- 1 1/3 c huckleberries
- 1/4 c sugar
- 1 tsp cornstarch
Instructions
- Combine 1.5 c flour and yeast, set aside.
- In a pan heat milk, sugar, butter and salt until 120 degrees F. Remove from burner. Once butter is melted, add flour/yeast mixture.
- Put mixture in a stand mixture on low with a paddle and add eggs one at a time. Then swap out to use hook attachment.
- Add remaining flour 1 cup at a time on low, then increase to medium for 3 minutes until dough forms.
- Grease a bowl with olive oil and put dough inside, flip over so it's coated on both sides. Cover with dish towel and set in warm area for 1.5 hours.
- Put dough on floured surface and punch down. Allow to rest for 10 minutes.
- In a bowl mix filling ingredients together.
- Roll dough out on the cutting board until it is about 20" x 10" in size. Pour filling on top and spread out leaving 1" empty along the edges.
- Roll up dough with fruit in the middle. Seal ends.
- Cut into 12 equal sized pieces and place in a 9×13" pan sprayed with non stick spray. Leave a bit of space in between each one to rise.
- Cover and allow to rise for 40 minutes.
- Preheat oven to 350 and bake for 30-40 minutes until they're golden brown on top.
- Take out and cool for 5 minutes. Melt or spread frosting on top before serving.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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