Blueberry Shortcake

This is really a nice dessert for the summer; simple, light, and delicious.

2.75 cups flour
a little salt
1 cup butter
1/2 cup light (single) cream or half and half (they both work)
1 egg
1 egg white
5 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder

2.5 cups blueberries
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup water
tiny amount of lemon.

To make the shortcakes, sift a little salt, all the flour, and the baking powder into a bowl. Add 3 tablespoons of granulated sugar and mix well (make them big tablespoons, incidentally). Freeze the butter, and then grate into the flour using the coarse end of the grater. Quickly work the frozen butter into the flour using your fingers. Crack the egg into the cream and mix well, and then tip the eggy cream into the dry ingredients, bringing the dough together. When this is well done, roll the dough out carefully to a relatively thick 3/4 of an inch, cut out whatever shapes you want, brush the top with an egg white, sprinkle with a little more granulated sugar, and then cook in a pre-heated 325 oven for 10-15 minutes.

As for the blueberry sauce, combine half the berries with all the other ingredients except the lemon. Cook for 10 minutes, bringing to a slow boil. Add the rest of the berries and simmer for another 8 minutes or so; just long enough for the new berries to be soft, but not to have lost their shape. Throw in some lemon for taste, let cool to just warm, and serve on top of the warm shortcakes with a scant scoop of preferably almond ice cream (vanilla, of course, will do).