I Like Blackberries

For years I  tried to get rid of the bramble bushes in the garden but when the idea of a less-work, more food-friendly garden hit me I decided  to encourage the brambles in a few places and cut them back severely elsewhere. After all, why not let some grow and have the pleasure of eating them? They remind me of my Scottish childhood where they grew all around in the fields and one of the pleasures of summer was to get scratched to bits blackberry-picking for tarts and pies.

This year there were a couple of places where they were  growing near the wall. I could see flowers forming so I allowed these to grow and cut the stems back elsewhere. In fact, the flower-forming branches often grew out for several feet but I cut them back to the flowers so they didn't invade the whole garden. This has worked well and I have had a small but usable crop of berries. 

Blackberries are not best eaten on their own though. They have too many seeds that get into the teeth. I certainly like the taste of the odd blackberry I've just picked but what I really like is a mixture of blackberries and  apples, one of the simplest,  most useful and delicious combinations you could wish to discover. Somehow their seeds seem to become absorbed by the apple. Their perfect partners are cooking apples so my Bramley tree is just the thing. Wild brambles have to my mind much more personality than the thornless, fatter and sweeter ones bred specially for gardens. 

I am not the only garden inhabitant who likes them. One of my blackberry bushes grows next to the golden privet where the sparrows hang out and just as I was about to pick a nice juicy berry the other day a young sparrow hopped out and took it from under my nose. 

The Bramley tree has always fruited generously and I usually have plenty of apples for immediate use with enough to freeze in batches as compote for winter.  I find a handful of blackberries will be enough to spice up a small saucepan of apples. And if you pick some of them before they are completely ripe, still a little bit red say, they add even more piquancy.  I add a sprinkling of cloves and cinnamon and a very small amount of brown sugar.  This mush (or compote) is delicious with cream or yogurt or créme fraiche or it can be turned into crumbles or pies or spread on pancakes or made into a serious dessert. The following Co-Op recipe can finish off a meal very satisfactorily. 

Blackberry and Apple Fool

1 green apple, thinly sliced; 100g runny honey; 250g blackberries; 250g Greek Yogurt

Simmer the apple slices over a high heat for a few minutes 

Remove the apples reserving the honey and split between two glasses 

Keeping a few aside, mash the blackberries, stir in the yogurt and spoon over the apple slices                                                                                                            

Drizzle the reserved honey over the top and decorate with a few blackberries 

• Personally, I am  inclined to mix some of the apple with the blackberries to help absorb the seeds, (see above).  

 

In autumn when things have died down and I can see what I'm doing, I cut every bit of every bramble right down to the ground, even pulling them up by the roots when possible. In spring when they begin to grow back, I can decide which to encourage and which to keep cutting back. In a small garden, you have to be ruthless, but it's pointless trying to eliminate them completely so why keep trying? I've had much more fun eating them than trying to get rid of them.