it’s blackberry season

I just picked and ate my first fresh blackberry of the year.

What do fellow blackberry fans do with them? Over the years I’ve done jam, liqueur and vinegar, but since getting CFS I often just put a load in the freezer and chuck a handful in when I’m cooking a gamey stew or some such.

Any other good ideas?

Use them to make blackberry ice cream

Apple & blackberry crumble, lots of it.

Houns wins.  There is no better than crumble!

Apparently blackberry whisky is very nice, even non whisky drinker like it, or so I’ve been told, I’m going to give it a go this year, did blackberry vodka last year but not a great success, raspberry works much better.

Chrimble crumble ftw!

Brambles aren’t ripe here yet in Angus, but been having some wild raspberries and Strawberries.

No blackberries but gooseberries and blaeberries picked today.

Apple and blackberry crumble Ice cream. It’s the shiznet. Make a plain vanilla ice cream, some standalone crumble, and a blackberry compote. Add the second two to the first when it’s nearly done and stir through to look a bit ripple-y, then into the freezer . But yes to plain blackberry ice cream as well

Hedgerow jelly with blackberries and whatever else you can find in the hedgerows(Bullaces, greengages, Haws, wild raspberry, copies of Razzle). Boil, strain, make jelly.

Plus liqueur. A sweet one. Ready in time for XMas.

Houns wins. There is no better than crumble!

This.

Agree – crumble for the taste and simplicity of making it.

Been eyeing up some fruity hot spots while walking the pooch. Looks like a bonanza crop this year here in SE Wales.

Blackberry mousse is delicious.

It does look like it’s going to be a really good blackberry harvest this year, presumably down to this shit weather.

We have lots of blaeberry out at the moment. I pick loads but somehow they never make it back to my house 🙂

1kg of blae/whin/bill Berry picked the other day.

No blackberries yet here. As well as crumble you can mix with cooking apples, cook in a microwave, stash in the fridge and add a dollop on your porridge, delicious.

No blackberries here yet (they’re still in flower). But looking forward to a bumper harvest, as this wet weather had made the brambles grow faster than ever.

First batch this evening. The majority are still green or flowering.

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No brambles yet but the youngest and me are away to pick some of the 100 plus yards of raspberries on the local disused railway line tomorrow and then make some jam

The main London-Bristol railway runs past the bottom of my road, and there’s a cut-through alongside the security fence into another road, where brambles grow over the top of the fence. The berries along there are huge, big, fat and juicy and are already quite sweet. When I walk along there into town I always pick a couple of handfuls to eat as I go, and I’ve been trying them for the last two or three weeks – they’re just about right now.

I’ll be going down there with a large plastic container and a folding foot stand and enjoying blackberries and double cream for as long as they last. I’m getting a second crop of raspberries on my small canes as well, so looking forward to those getting bigger next year.

Blaeberries hitting prime ripeness in the valley

Blackberry infused whisky. Absolutely love it.

Also did raspberry last year for the first time which was just as nice.

We do hedgerow brandy, blackberries and whatever sloes/ bullaces are left over from gin/ vodka, plus a few peppercorns in there and some almonds, gives it a bit of spice and the almonds weirdly make it taste like it has been in wood barrel.

Also make sloe gin, with some fennel seeds to give it a slight aniseed kick, the sloes when they come out then go in scrumpy cider for a fortnight

Then bullaces go into vodka

Chuck a handful in your porridge as is.

And..the best with Ice Cream.

The best ice cream ever is as follows:

2 x 300ml double cream

Tin of condensed milk 398ml

Mix together, whip to a consistency with troughs forming.

Decant into flat tubs

Freeze, ready in around 8 hours.

….

You will not eat any other iceream there after, ever.

Ps it does not last long .

2.5kg of blackberries will make 12 bottles of rather nice wine.

Blackberry crumble yesterday, lovely with some vanilla ice cream.

It’s going to be a bumper season this year …..

I tend to make jam, crumbles and cobblers but will try the mousse

If you have bilberries growing nearby, I can recommend them with a tin of creamed rice pudding; when I was a lot younger and less obsessive about weight in the rucksack, I’ve been known to carry a couple of tins high into the hills for a weekend camping and just gorged myself on them. There were plenty of bilberries in the valleys north of the Carneddau a couple of days ago.