Preserving blackberries

Autumn makes me want to pick and preserve and jam and pickle and generally recreate this pantry:

from Jill Barklem's Brambly Hedge books

Like Jo at All the Blue Day I blame the books I read as a child, especially Enid Blyton where the children (okay, the girls. That's another blog post) arrange impromptu larders in caves and tree roots and rustle up meals from a loaf of bread, a lettuce, plenty of hard boiled eggs, some radishes and a tin of peaches. (I actually serve meals like that. I blame the Famous Five entirely).

In Five on a Hike Together one of the Five (Dick, I think) asks "Why is it that people on farms always have the most delicious food? I mean, surely people in towns can bottle raspberries and pickle onions and make cream cheese?" George replies that her mother did when she lived in a town and "anyway, I'm going to when I'm grown-up. It must be so wonderful to offer home-made things by the score when people come to a meal!" That's such an interesting statement with regards to social history and as far as my personal history is concerned, I think that was the beginning of wanting to milk the cow, skim the cream, make the butter, pickle the onions and bottle the fruit. I can remember buying a jam making book as a student newly living away from home and making plum and apple jam, much to the bemusement of my flat mates. I chose plum and apple because they were cheap and high in pectin. I think that jam practically bounced but it was the beginning of making it myself.

So, whilst the girls were packing for a Ranger Guide trip to Rome (excited doesn't begin to cover it!) and son and his girlfriend were making homemade pasta for tea (because why yes, my family is just like the Ingalls), husband and I went blackberrying.

Lots more to come. They're early this year, it is only August

Beautiful berries

Some are still flowering

Rosehips to come too

A smeuse*, probably made by a fox, but possibly a muntjack deer

Finished pickings

With some coaching  through making shortcrust pastry (‘don’t knead it! It’s not bread!’) husband made a delicious one crust apple and blackberry tart for pudding. Is there a name for those quick rustic tarts? Roll out pastry, cover the middle with fruit, sprinkle with sugar and spices if you like (or glaze with jam) and then fold the edges up and over leaving most of the fruit exposed in the middle. Glaze the pastry top with egg or milk and bake. Very quick and simple and no pastry trimmings to find a use for.

Blackberry and Apple leather, ready to go in the dehydrator

Today I made seedless blackberry and apple jam, spiced blackberry vinegar, apple and blackberry fruit leather and a blackberry and apple cake that didn’t work very well- it was far too wet and stayed stodgy rather than moist. Oh well, it tastes alright, I think I’ll cover up the stodginess with custard and serve it as pudding.

Spiced blackberry vinegar and Blackberry and Apple jam, waiting to be labelled

Seedless blackberry jam  (from The Cottage Smallholder which I can no longer link to)

1kg blackberries
350g apples
water
granulated sugar

Roughly chop the apples, removing any bruised bits.
Put in a large pan with the blackberries with water to just cover and simmer until completely soft. Sieve or mouli and weigh the pulp.
Add 1llb sugar to each 1lb pulp.
Heat very gently until the sugar is dissolved (if you boil it before it's dissolved it will stay gritty).
Increase to a rolling boil until set achieved.

I do a flake test, watching how the jam falls from the end of the spoon and then a wrinkle test if it looks ready. Turn off the pan so it doesn't overboil, put a spoonful of jam on a chilled plate (I put two in the freezer when I start) and push it with a finger when it's cool. If it wrinkles it's set. If it's not ready, turn on the heat again and boil for another few minutes. If you're not sure, err on the side of soft set. You can always reboil if absolutely necessary and slightly runny jam is better than rock hard. If it really won't set, relabel it syrup or cordial and eat on ice cream or porridge, or diluted as a drink with hot, cold or fizzy water. or even added to gin or whisky.

Pot into sterilised jars. Sterilise by putting washed jars in a low oven or putting through a run on the dishwasher. I'm never organised enough to time that right so I use the oven and pour boiling water over the lids. There is a way of sterilising in the microwave but I don't own one. NB I'm British and am happy to put jam and chutney into hot reused jam jars and do the lids up tight. If you would rather hot water bath the finished jam, proceed as you normally would.

Don't be tempted to increase quantities, even if you have tonnes of fruit. Big batches on a domestic stove take a long time to heat and boil to setting point and become frustrating and too well-cooked.

                   

                    'She did her best; she asked advice of Mrs Cornelius; she racked her brain to  

                            remember what Hannah did that she had left undone; she re-boiled, re-sugared,    and re-strained, but that dreadful stuff wouldn't "jell"...

                              In the kitchen reigned confusion...Lotty... was calmly eating bread and                                              currant-wine, for the jelly was still in a hopelessly liquid state, while Mrs. Brooke, with her apron over her head, sat sobbing dismally."

                                                                                         
                                                                                                      Good Wives by Louisa May Alcott


* A local dialect word for a hole in a hedge or wall, probably made by an animal. It's considered obsolete but I think it should be resurrected.