Tales from the Fruit Garden

Posted by Rosie

"Those raspberries are yummy Mum," called Tom from the fruit garden.

"There aren't any raspberries yet," I replied.

"Yes there are and they are yummy."

I wandered over to the mystery raspberries:

"Ahhh - THOSE raspberries!! They are actually my first Tayberries and yes - you're right - they are yummy."

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Today as well as the tayberries I picked jostaberries (a very meagre crop), 3lbs of blackcurrants, more strawberries and Sawfly caterpillars. Grrr - it would appear the second wave is here and once again it is my poor Worcesterberry they are munching. Luckily I'd gone to see if the fruit was ripe and spotted the caterpillars before they could do too much damage. And because I had a bowl with me I collected them up and fed them to the chickens, who eventually realised they were edible but only when I mixed them with a bit of their feed. Talk about slow on the uptake.

The strawberries are reaching the end of their season but with the hot sun of the last few days their already good flavour has really intensified and I'm back to eating them straight from the plant. The blackcurrants have also been fantastic. I brought the bushes with me from England and how they survived I don't know. First they were dug up in a mini-heatwave and then left in plastic sacks in my old garden for several days before being shoved in a van and transported over here, only to be put in a shed and forgotten about for 3 weeks. Unwatered and in the dark for all that time I really thought they'd be dead but a quick scrape of the bark indicated some life so I potted them up. I planted them out in the spring and slowly they have gone from strength to strength rewarding me this year with over 5lbs of huge blackcurrants. I've made some jam, eaten loads on my breakfast muesli and I'm off now to search for other recipes. Any ideas?