Berries. Berries!

I luuuuurve Oregon's berry season. What we lack in sunshine, we definitely make up for in well-endowed fruit. Some of you might have heard that I have a teensy bit of a sweet tooth. Or a gigantic Paul Bunyan sized bicuspid of one. So when the berry bounty is in full swing, I feel good about satisfying my urges in a more natural fashion. Like more natural than a jumbo box of rainbow nerds, for example. Or a half pound of salt water taffy. You get the idea.

It starts with the rhubarb. Then come the strawberries. Then the raspberries, followed by my favorite: The jumbo Oregon Blackberry varities. I'm pretty sure no other berry will ever compare, and I've come to terms with this.

All summer long I come up with different ways to manipulate all this fruit into desserts, my favorite being the Crisp. They're easy, you can virtually mix any kind of berry together and it will meld OK, and I usually have all of the ingredients on hand. I'm a firm believer that if you take some berries, mix them with a little bit of sugar, then top it with some semblance of oats, sugar, and butter -- it will turn out amazing and stun everyone you feed it to. Of course, you can add little variations - a little cinnamon here, some walnuts here - but seriously, it's pretty hard to screw up a crisp.

Plus, it's the perfect dessert to show up with at a BBQ. Here's the recipe I based my most recent crisp adventure on, from Molly Katzen's Dessert book.

Strawberry-Rhubarb Crisp

2 lb fresh rhubarb, cut in 1-inch chunks
3 cups sliced strawberries
1/3 c sugar
1 1/4 c rolled oats
1 c flour
1/4 c brown sugar
3/4 tsp cinnamon
dash or two of allspice and nutmeg
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup melted butter

Preheat oven to 375. Mix your fruit with the white sugar. Mix together remaining ingredients. Put this on top of the fruit. Bake for 40 minutes. I told you it was easy.