A glossy purple clot, Tom Waits, brown betty crumble and two excellent drinks
Abundance: Monday 16 September
No matter how many years I take to the hedgerows, my heart overrules what my head knows: blackberries are a late summer fruit. Seamus Heaney1 knew. ‘Summer’s blood’ is in them.
And yet it makes no sense: blackberries - complex and indirect - taste of autumn, with none of strawberries’ easy summer brightness. Strawberries are There She Goes, an easy to love open book; blackberries are all The Heart of Saturday Night and feel like they have something left to tell you.
In the days when an entire Saturday was given over to the FA Cup Final, blackberrying caused families - kids grumpy at being torn from the telly, parents bickering after a fruitless search for Tupperware lids to match their tubs - to stream from homes2 as if called by an invisible church bell. Out to verges, overgrown hedges, and - in our case - the semi-choked path of the old railway line, in search of free fruit3. What Beeching discarded, nature reclaimed.
For every blackberry we popped purple-fingered into a tub, we ate two. It was not without jeopardy: Heaney’s weren’t the only hands ‘peppered with thorn pricks’, and there was last of the jasper Luftwaffe and the seed-heavy nettles to contend with. As delicious as those blackberries straight from the bush were, Mum’s blackberry and apple pie - to see us through the weekend before going back to school - was the real prize. These decades later, I can still taste it.
I do pick a few blackberries in August, hoping for ‘heavy rain and sun for a full week’, but I don’t enjoy it the same as when I have a cold nose4, though this means playing stick or twist with early autumn sun ripening those that are ‘hard as a knot’ in mid August.
Out on this morning’s footpaths winding up towards the woods, amongst the honeysuckle and beech, there are still plenty of blackberries, if marble-small and tight. I grow some in the garden too, and this sunny week has seen a late flush. While the peak of homegrown blackberries may come earlier, larger, juicier, sweeter and more heavily than their wild relatives, I certainly wouldn’t choose them over the complexity and the gentle palaver of foraging.
Folklore has it that Archangel Michael defeated Satan in battle, banishing him from heaven to hell, arse-first into a blackberry bush, causing him to spit on the bush and curse its fruit - hence you oughtn’t to eat blackberries after Old Michaelmas Day (10 October), but good luck finding some so late, or - if you do - free of mould.
I think the plant in the garden might be Oregon Thornless, or possibly Waldo: whichever, a sunny afternoon this month with the football on the radio will find me dealing with the old stems. Each year, blackberries grow long shoots (canes) that develop fruiting side shoots (laterals) the following year; my job is to tie the young canes to the arch to fruit next year, and prune the old canes with their spent laterals back to the base (they’ll not fruit again).
It’s one of those gentle interventions that connects you to the garden, simultaneously to the moment and to next summer - or should that be autumn. So much of what goes on out here is popping something in the bank for another time, that future-you will be grateful of.
Apple and blackberry brown betty crumble
Many years ago, I came across a recipe for Brown betty - imagine a layered dessert of, alternately, stewed apple and sweet, spiced breadcrumbs - and it sounded too good to be true. It almost was. This takes the best of it and combines it with the never-unwelcome crumble topping.
You could, if you prefer, have two fruit layers with the apple and blackberries mixed, but like this, the blackberries soak into the breadcrumb layer and just hint at spicing the apples.
Serves 6
5 largish eating apples
Juice of one lemon
300g blackberries
50g caster sugar
90g bread, crusts removed
50g soft light brown sugar
30g butter, melted
For the crumble
80g plain flour
40g rolled oats
80g butter, cut into cubes
40g golden granulated sugar
Nutmeg
Salt
First make the crumble by swizzing the flour, sugar and butter together in a food processor. Stir through the oats and a good pinch of salt. Tip the crumble into a large bowl.
For the breadcrumb layer, swizz the bread in a food processor until it forms largish crumbs. Add the butter and sugar and swizz in short pulses until it forms medium breadcrumbs - don’t worry if you over process it and it starts to come together a little too much, you can always tease it into more of a crumb.
Heat the oven to 190°C fan.
Peel and core the apples, cutting them into smallish chunks; as you go, place them in a bowl and stir them through the lemon juice to prevent discolouring.
Place the apples in a medium sized baking dish 20cm x 20cm or so). Add just enough water to coat the base to encourage the apples to give in. Spread the breadcrumbs over the top. Dot with the blackberries. Spoon over a thin layer of the crumble mix and then add a very generous scratching of nutmeg. Spoon over the rest of the crumble mix.
Place in the centre of the oven and cook for 30 minutes. Use a cake skewer to see if the apples have surrendered to the heat; if not, cover with foil to prevent the crumble burning, and give it a little longer. Once you are happy with the apples, remove the foil and allow a few minutes for the crumble to finish cooking if needed.
Remove from the oven and leave to rest for 15 minutes so allow the crumble to develop crunch and the fruit to calm down from being molten lava.
Serve with custard, or cream, either soured or double.
Blackberry whisky
This is an extraordinary drink, peculiar in that - had you not known its constituents - you are unlikely to identify either the blackberry or whisky in the result. It really is so very good, and while you may - as I would’ve been before tasting it - be hesitant to risk a bottle of smoky single malt, you will be well rewarded. That said, a bottle of blended will make you a very very fine version too.
Put 600g of blackberries and a 700ml whisky into a jar large enough to accommodate the. I used to add 130g caster sugar but I no longer do: it just doesn’t improve for its addition. I favour an Islay single malt - Laphroaig or similar - as its smokiness works so well and adds a little more autumn to the result. Seal the jar and upend and shake whenever you remember to over the next couple of months. Strain and funnel into a sterilised bottle and allow the flavour to develop: a year is good, longer even better, but I know you’ve seen Christmas around the corner and I won’t deny you a tot or two.
Don’t discard the boozy fruit, it is wonderful with stewed apples or added to an apple crumble.
Blackberry vinegar
Blackberry vinegar is - depending on your disposition - either a superb, vaguely balsamic like vinegar that suits beetroot, goat’s cheese and anywhere a fruity/sharp dressing might be required, or a superb, effective cold remedy. I have to say, on those nights where you have a little hankering for a glass of what you fancy, this with 3 parts sparkling water5 and a slice of lime works wonders.
The weight of sugar or honey varies a little: it should be three quarters the weight of the sieved vinegar in sugar/honey - eg if you have 500g vinegar once strained, add 375g sugar or honey.
300g blackberries
500ml apple cider vinegar
caster sugar/honey
Place the blackberries in a good sized jar and add the vinegar. Allow to infuse for 14 days or so at room temperature.
Strain through a sieve, catching the liquid in a pan. Bring to a gentle simmer. Stir in the sugar or honey until dissolved, then boil for 5 minutes.
Funnel into warm bottles and seal.
Even the most poetry averse, cannot avoid falling for Seamus Heaney’s paragraphs of perfection
See also: Bonfire night’s firework display, the carnival, Concorde passing overhead
If you are British, it is incumbent on you to pass this peculiar pastime on to your children, along with reticence, irrational unfocused shame and an inability to express your feelings
Having a later blackberry season is, along with dandelion and burdock, and musical brilliance, one of the more compelling reasons for living in the north
Yes, or sparkling wine…
Blackberry hoard has been dismal down in Dartmouth this year ... and someone has nicked all the apples from the Community Orchard (happened last year too) so no apple and blackberry brown betty for me !!!
Just checking as I really want to do the blackberry whisky. Is 70 mls really the amount of whisky as it does’nt seem a lot. Thanks for recipe though.