I hope it doesn’t lower me in your esteem when I tell you that this is the first year in ten that we’ve harvested our abundant, free, blackberry black raspberry crop, from blackberry black raspberry bushes that grow maintenance-free in our yard. The children kept going out into the yard and coming back full of snack, so I finally ventured out and found that the crop above the 4-foot level was FORMIDABLE.
In my defense, and in the paraphrased words of Jillian Michaels, blackberries black raspberries DON’T COME FOR FREE.
I have thorn scratches and bug bites all over my arms and ankles, and I would not even describe myself as someone who particularly LIKES blackberries black raspberries—though the mosquitoes clearly think I’m ker-razy for feeling ambivalent, since they themselves have strong feelings on the issue and have spelled out those feelings in a dot-to-dot worksheet on my body.
I’ve given one batch to my parents, and I’m freezing my third batch as we speak. I remembered reading that the right way to freeze berries was to put them single-layer on a cookie sheet and freeze them, and THEN transfer them to a plastic baggie, so that’s what I’m doing and I’m hoping I’m right, but I also don’t really care because, as I mentioned, I don’t particularly like blackberries black raspberries. What I mostly like is feeling like a pioneer as I pick, gather, and, er, freeze in my multi-cubic-foot electric freezer. Just like Caroline Ingalls did, amirite?
And for all you modern-day Mrs. Ingallses, I recommend having a few shots of liquor before you venture out a-pickin’, because it makes all the stab-and-PULL assaults of thorns so much less bothersome.
So. I’m coming to move into your backyard. Hope you don’t mind. Blackberries are my favourite.
Very Ma Ingalls. Remember in the Big Woods book, when they made a balloon out of a pig’s bladder, and it was the best toy ever? Yeah. Our kids have it pretty good, I think.
My strawberry plants finally bore fruit this year, and I felt so completely cool picking berries for my morning breakfast. Like I had really accomplished something….growing the fruit off my body, you’d think.
So having fruitful blackberry bushes in my yard would completely do me in.
Did you plant the bushes or are they volunteers? We planted one this year, which I don’t think is even supposed to bear fruit until next year, only to have some kind of berries that might be blackberries spring up unannounced in another corner of the yard. The reason I’m not 100% sure what they are is because the birds keep eating them before I ever see them ripe.
I think the previous owner planted them. He seemed KEEN on FRUIT, and we’ve already had to remove a moldy grapevine and two diseased plum trees.
Swistle, I love you and grew up calling these blackberries too. But if you’re using them in a specific recipe, you might like to know that many people would call these black raspberries. I hope you’re having a happy fourth!
My kids, especially my 1-year-old, are in LOVE with blackberries this year. You would be THE house of the neighborhood if we lived near you.
Enjoy the fruits of your labor! I loved the “Little House in the Big Woods” series like mad, but couldn’t get over the misery of “The Long Winter”. Why-ever would one choose to live in such a place? Then I married my husband, who hails from Wisconsin (in my defense, I met him in the much-warmer-Maryland, at grad school), and started traveling to similarly cold/dreary places every other winter.
The weather alone may be why I much preferred the “Anne of Green Gables” series (LOVED THEM). I should have married a Canadian.
Well you definitely have the pioneering SPIRIT. Well done.
Hope you enjoy your harvest! I don’t pick berries because I’m simply too much of a baby to deal with the thorns. But I did hear the funniest thing yesterday, Cat Nip apparently repells mosquitos. You’ll have every cat in the neighbourhood rubbing all over you but bug bites, not a one! Haha, hope you had a great weekend!
I remember going to a campground as a kid that had lots of blackberries growing here and there. Love that the kids came back “full of snack!” I feel like you BRAVED something to get those berries so I hope you can discover a yummy way to use them.
Holy DEET! I’m quite a mosquito attractor myself. Next time, long sleeves for sure!
I also like to freeze berries like that and then, when making lunch for the kid, grab a handful or two, run it under water from the sink, and by the time he’s ready for the fruit-for-dessert portion of the meal, they’re mostly thawed and he loves them. Like ice cream in his sad toddler world. I actually do this with most fruits & veggies for him. Perhaps he’ll never know most people eat peas/green beans/corn WARM!
Wow! You’re like a Mama-bear, grousing for berries for your cubs! Well, for your cubs and aging-bear-parents.
The look delicious, fwiw! Sorry about your arms/hands… perhaps some heavy-duty elbow length gloves are in order? Plus, that way, you could pick IN STYLE. ;)
Yup. Those are definitely black raspberries.
I grew up picking all those wild berries: blackberries, huckleberries, mulberries, raspberries, elderberries, strawberries…you name it, I had to pick it. They are good, but I like blackberries better. More juice, less seeds.
Ouchy.
Caroline Ingalls probably would have spread them on a sheet to dry in the sun! Thank God for the freezer! How about Black raspberry ice cream made in one of those balls the kids roll around? Do they really work? Sounds like such fun!! Black raspberry muffins or black raspberry crisp with vanilla ice cream…yum.
You really sacrificed your skin for those berries.
We have the same berry situation bordering our yard. I’ve Ma-Ingallsed mine into pie. As the others said, they’re black raspberries. I don’t know the proper botanical terms, but when you pull the berry off its cane and it comes away leaving a neat little hollow inside the berry, that means it’s a raspberry. With blackberries, that piece of stem inside the berry doesn’t detach and you won’t have a hollow inside.
Just in case you miss it on FB: this would be a great use for your berries, once they’re frozen!
http://www.instructables.com/id/5-minute-Ice-Cream/
Ugh – I used to have a backyard full of blackberries, too, and I just couldn’t NOT pick them, even though I’m not a big fan either.
But, you know, FREE BLACKBERRIES!
Every year, I picked them like mad, froze them, then I made batches and batches of blackberry jam and gave it away – you know, teachers and grandmothers just love that stuff!
We have those too, and I hate trying to pick them even though I feel guilty letting them die. I’m just not a huge blackberry/black raspberry/whatever fan either. It seems like so much WORK for a little bowl of berries!
Oh, since you’re already in the pioneer spirit, try Pioneer Woman’s Blackberry Cobbler! Blackberries aren’t my favorite either, but this was really good. (I think it would work even if they’re black raspberries.) The link is: http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2007/08/the_great_cobbl/
but it is basically stir together 1 cup of sugar and 1 cup self-rising flour, stir in 1 cup of milk, stir in 1 stick melted butter. Put 2 cups berries in greased baking dish and pour batter on top. Sprinkle a little more sugar on top. Bake for an hour (at 350?). Very easy — my six year did almost all of it — and very, very tasty! Well it should be with all that butter and sugar but still. If you don’t have self-rising flour, you can just add a little baking powder and maybe salt to regular flour.
So I am pushing this product to anyone who mentions the word mosquito-the Off Clip On. We got some before Memorial Day, because where I live the mosquitoes make it hard to go outside, any time of day, period. It was like a miracle, you would see the mosquito approach, then veer off, approach again, and finally give up in despair. It is just the little fan thing that whirrs out bug repellent, I can’t smell anything-and it is so nice not to be drenched in Deep Woods Off for the whole summer.
Welcome to my childhood!!
HATED picking blackberries as a child. finally my mom said “Fine, don’t pick. We just won’t have jam” and all of us kids went “OKAY!” (:-D
Swistle For the Win!!!
Isn’t that funny? When I first read this I thought to myself that they looked like black raspberries (which I like way better than what I call blackberries) but figured that blackberries are just what some people call black raspberries. And now you’ve changed your text…
You’re very lucky, it’s extremely hard to find black raspberries around here!
Hmmmm pie or scones would be perfect :)
I LOVE them, however I have very bad memories of being sent out as a child to pick raspberries never-ending. The bugs really do love them. In my case it was mosquitoes, wasps AND red ants that bite like a SOB. Not fun. As as adult I’d suffer it though. Raspberries and blackberries sell for $5/lb here! Enjoy them