[Closed] Foraging. It's that time of year!

plums and apples for jam, chutney and crumble, tick.

did blackberries for blackberry whiskey this weekend, tick.

Sloes sussed, this years sloe gin planned.

damsons spotted, jam planned

chanterelles are carpeting the woods near me
and brambles - toast some pinhead oatmeal with a small amount of brown sugar. whip some cream, add some honey, whiskey and most of the oatmeal. mash some brambles with a splash of whisky and fold in to the cream. last of the oatmeal and a few of the jucier brambles on top.
mmmmmbramble cranachan

There are some fantastic "glut" recipes on [url= http://www.allotment.org.uk/ ]here[/url]

Mirabell plum jam - done
Sloe gin - done
Damson jam - done
Stewed apple for crumbles etc over the winter months on the list...
Going fishing for bass to fill the freezer - on the list.
Liking BBSB's blackberry recipe will give that a go.
All my recipes are off t'interweb and I just choose the easiest to do - when there is a glut of fruit I just want to get the processing part done and move onto the eating 😀

There are some fantastic "glut" recipes on here

I can confirm this. 🙂

I have about 8kg of blackberries in the freezer, ideal for morning smoothies, also have loads of apples which will become apple pies!

Slow gin a festering from last weekend and should be ready in a couple of months, mmmmm.
How do you guys prepare your berries? Do you bash or prick? It’s our first year and pricked all the berries but it took and absolute age!

bilberry jam, bilberrry vodka, blackberry crumble yesterday, wild raspberry and lemon verbena jam.

Was out blackberrying yesterday at St Catherines Point (most southerly part of the IOW) and it was a gorgeous afternoon. Berries weren't as big as previous years, but plenty of them and its still early!

A lady at work gave me a quick tip the other day for sloes. When you've made your sloe gin, keep the sloes and put them in a bottle of sherry - apparently it makes a nice liquor(sp) type drink!

Lots of apples to peel tonight - probably make some apple chutney and stewed apple for pies/ crumbles etc. Made some nice beetroot chutney the other week - beetroot from our friends allotment.

I've got a ton of damsons ready to pick in my garden, but i don't like jam or wine and i'm short of other ideas. I might try and make some fruit leather out of them - just blend them up and cook the pulp in thin sheets on the lowest oven temperature overnight. Any other suggestions?

Full list of annual foraging;-

Mushrooms nearly all year round
Elder flowers - cordial & 'champagne'
Elder berries - pontact sauce
Crab apples - makes lovely spiced jelly
Most fruit we forage goes into jams, jellies, chutneys, alcohol infusions or wines;-
Sloes
Blackberries
Redberries
Blueberries
Raspberries
Rowan berries
Haws
Rose hips
Plus;-
apples and pears
Sweet chestnuts
Samphire
Nettles - makes great pesto

The River Cottage 'Hedgerow', 'Edible Seashore' and 'Mushrooms' books are excellent carry anywhere for reference.

As I always say to people who give me funny looks, 'You can't knock free food!'

Going fishing for bass to fill the freezer - on the list.

🙂

Caught my first on holiday a week or so ago! Was only a schooly though. Be careful about minimum size limits, you mustnt go taking all the young ones.

Far easier to fill the freezer with mackeral i reckon.

Finbar: [url= http://www.waitrose.com/home/recipes/recipe_directory/d/damson_muffins.html ]Damson muffins[/url] or [url= http://www.cottagesmallholder.com/two-recipes-wild-damson-gin-and-sloe-gin-37 ]Damson Gin[/url] or [url= http://www.deliaonline.com/recipes/type-of-dish/chutney/spiced-damson-chutney.html ]Damson Chutney[/url]

- 3 or 4 blackberry and apple/plum crumbles so far
- loads of blackberry muffins
- 2 bottles elderflower champagne (tastes shed loads better than normal champers)
- blackberry whiskey underway

So far, I've made blackberry & apple jam, blackberry & apple crumble, and blackberry & rhubarb pavlova. Lovely!

Thanks willyboy, i might make some chutney out of them.

Planning on producing 100L of cider this year as a small first run 🙂

sandwicheater, dont bash or prick the sloes, freeze them for a day or 2 first, then use them as normal, saves a lot of time! About to bottle 5 litres from last years harvest of sloes, then i will steep the gin soaked fruit in cider for a month!....Hic! 😀

Planning on producing 100L of cider this year as a small first run

Any chance of a taste after directing you to the free apples? 😉 😉

2 gallons of plum wine just about finished fermenting, ready for stopping and bottling this weekend.

2 gallons of elderberry and damson wine, still producing more hot air than TJ. Will rack them into the plum demijohns later on.

Loads of various plum purees already in the freezer. My neighbour has a 36 litre apple press, so going to sort out a pressurised barrel and make some perry and cider in a bit.

Blackberries starting to come out. Will give them another week or so before picking, hopefully get a bit more sun on them.

And 20+ pumpkins growing down the bottom of the garden. Some fro Jr to hack to bits, some for Mrs S to make pumpkin soup for the freezer and some for me to make pumpkin rum with. *hic*

hedge porn?

never done it before, but looking to get blackberries this year as a starting point.in Newcastle, so they're not really out yet, I think in a week or two they should be good

must have eaten my bodyweight in plums LOL

In fairness though Emsz, you are very tiny so that's not really an awful lot. 🙂

PP - I'm sure something could be arranged 🙂

7lb of Blackberries and Elderberries turned into 3gallons, approx 15/17 bottles of 13% wine.The other jar is just a generic Cabernet Sauvignon.

😛

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Nice one CaptainCarbon, thanks to you I’ve now a 2 hour window in which I can go for a quick ride this week. 😉

Just been to the LBS (2wheels), and in the rear public car park, there a pear tree. Never noticed it before but now it's bloated with ripe pears.... all 20 feet up... very annoying.

Last winter really gave everything a kick start round here (fruit tree wise), as for all the years I've parked there I've never noitced the tree bearing fruit before.

not sure whether its just a recent thing but have had reports of a few people saying that this and last years' crop of plums have been ravaged by wasps 😯 .
anyone else experienced similar, and know whether its the norm or a new trend?

Done enough jam from 4lbs of blackberries over the weekend to last a year so thanks for the whisky and wine tips! It's an epic year for them.
Picked a few chanterelles from my woods but am giving up on fungi this year as I can't beat the deer or badgers to them. Tempted by a trip to some of these chanterelle-carpeted woods - I love the things!

Are all you guys "down south", not seen much in the way of soft fruits ready for picking in Staffordshire while out walking. Actually spotted some sloes on a walk a couple of weekends ago but there didn't seem to be many and they seemed small. But then I've never seen one before so I might have just over sized them in my imagination. I thought they'd be the size of damsons or slightly smaller. These I spotted were smaller than a mid size blackberry. Also spotted some bilburys reecntly but again these seemed small and not ready for picking either.

Speaker2animals: there seem to be 2 kinds of blackberry in Bristol - one variety has been ready for about 3 weeks, and is plump but not very sweet. The other variety is much smaller and nowhere near ripe yet.

As for bilberries, my parents were picking those (in Lancashire) back in July. They call them wimberries up there.

Magic mushrooms out yet?

They are at this end of the M4 8)

Had poached egg on home made bread with fried puffball Saturday morning. It may not have been magic mushroom but it's a super tasty fungus.

Just mentioned to the kids today we'll have to go and pick some Blackberries and Apples again for pies and crumbles. Maybe Thusrday afternoon if I'm done at work in good time.

hedge porn?

Harvests have been in decline since the early 1990s.

Probably something to do with global warming or the Tories.

Been on to the local hills and picked about 2kg worth of blackberries and few wild raspberries plus a good crop of different apples.

Made 3 Apple and Blackberry cakes and 4 Apple and Blackberry crumbles over the past week or 2.

Also frozen loads for future use. Will be heading up again over the next few days as more ripen.

Not bothered with the sloes this year. The red elderberries are just about ready so will pick some of them too to make syrup.

Magic mushrooms out yet?

found a couple of these which are rather more fun than liberties as long as you know what you are doing*

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*By this I mean A: know how to correctly identify them and B: know how to correctly and safely work out a dose with a margin of error to allow for variance in the strength of the mushroom

@ Stoner, I wouldn't bottle it yet, you'll just end up with a load of sludge in the bottom of your bottles.
After you've put the crushed campden tablet in, swirl the jar around for a couple of minutes, you need to get rid of the excess gas.
Put your bung and airlock back in, then put it somewhere cool and dark.
Once every day take the bung out and swirl about again, after 3 or 4 days, leave it alone until you can see the sediment sinking down.
After a week or so, syphon (rack) off into a clean jar, repeat until clear.

HTH. 😉

This is a very middle-aged thread. Do you also have those bellies that swell out your nice 'factory' mtb clobber? Come on. Oh god. How many of you are cycling in white training shoes?

You're trying a bit too hard van cough cough.

How many of you are cycling in white training shoes?

I wear red patent Sidis but them I'm fast enough to get away with it and good friends with Dorothy 😉

After some of those Tazzy I'm good friends with Dorothy too 😉

Graeme - cheers for that. Was going to ask you whether I should dose with pectolase to clear?

Pectolase will help, but it's more effective if you put it in at the start of fermentation, no problem though!If you can, get some Potassium Sorbate to add in with the Campden Tablets, all these together should have the wine clearing off without the need for any finings of any sort.
Good luck! 🙂

Middle aged!!

Cheeky, I'm 20.

Plum jam, plum vodka and blackberry vodka so far still got more plums and apples for chutney then hopefully off to pick more blackberrys and sloes at the weekend.

Is there an easy way to make Bramble jam.

does of pectolase went in at the beginning. was just wondering if a second does after the campden tabs was a good idea. will have a go.

How to pick very high fruit. 1 long stick to suit. 1 2 litre pop bottle. Cut bottom off bottle and jam the neck on the stick. Ensure that no sharp bit sticks through or pad it with news paper. Put under fruit and push. Instant un damaged fruit.

Now is the time to harvest. Bloody blackberries everywhere . we still have wild strawberries running riot ii the garden. Am fighting the squirels for nuts in the garden but if they get too pushy a 12 bore means squirel pie. Nice on a BBQ. Rose hips and crab apples from the woods make nice jam and wine. The maize is nearly ready. 1 or 2 cobs from the 30 acre field are not missed. The deer season has started try asking around! Or road kill! A nice sized deer was lieing by the road on the way home to night. The mess on the road was still steaming but I was beaten to it. this time of year is good for swaps as well eg spuds for honey etc. Best deal yet was 1 pound of strong cheddar recieved in exchange for 2 dead squirels. 😆

Another lot won't hurt, but the first dose should have sorted the job out. Sorry for the tardiness of my reply, but I'm at work now. 😮

With it getting colder they become less common so last weekend I made a huge dog shit carrier bag

We did a load of Damson picking yesterday whilst out on one of our fave walks in the S'Downs...

Jammin, Jammin, hope you like Jammin too..

But MrsBouy insists it's too early to pick the Sloe Berrys. I've never done Sloe anything (except riding, hardy harr harr) SHe's quite adamant (no not Prince Charming) that you shouldn't pick these fellas until the first frost..

D'oth she speak the trutheth or d'oth lies spew from her mouth??

Do tell..

Just had a fantastic foraging start to the day - found 3 perfect, huge parasol mushrooms and picked a load of blackberries ... So it'll be wild mushroom risotto and blackberry crumble for dinner tonight 🙂

Made my first batch of Damson jam this week. Damsons not quite as ripe as could be which made for a lovely jam with a really nice balance of bite and sweetness. The kids and I have a spot where no one else seems to pick them. Waiting for the greengages to be read also - although we normally eat these before getting home as they as sooooo nice.

Went camping in Malham a couple of days ago too and the farmhouse that we stayed in the garden of had loads of plum trees, the owner kept telling us to help ourselves.

I love the satisfaction that you get from 'natures larder'.

I did loads of Mirabelles and wild plums, just made jam and wild plum crumble.
We get hazlenuts here, but they dissapear overnite...frickin wildlife.

Do I need to check for Sloes now?

I can also find lots of giant puffballs? massive things like footballs, but I don't like the taste.

16 jars of Jam

4 jars of Chutney

good work lass.

My neighbour and I have just finished pressing another 5 gallons of perry.

This season we have between us, made:
70 bottles of apple juice (pasteurised, so will keep for a year or so)
20 gallons of cider
8 gallons of perry
2 gallons of damson & elderberry wine
2 gallons of plum wine.

*hic*

😯

Party at yours then Stoner?

not for 3 months till its all come on in the bottle/barrel.

Someone left a tub of sloes on my doorstep last week.
Which was nice.
No idea who though, so I'm hoping there not spiked with poison 😀

Wow impressive stuff guys!

nom. Just finished my 4th parasol mushroom breakfast in five days.

I love this time of the year, and living on the common.
Perfect timing, cycling back from dropping Jr off at school in the morning, peering across the common between the cows and spying a parasol. Pluck it out and straight in the pan 5 minutes later.

Washed down with homemade apple juice.

Doesnt get better

*buurrrrprpppp*

Blackberries seem to be a poor harvest in the north west this year, not nearly as good as last year. Got 5 carrier bags full of apples yesterday though - make amazing apple juice!

We've had two seasons of fruit this year. One in Hants where early ripening brought us the first crop of Damsons for Jam, then last week we spent our time in Harrogate where the season there is still running on, so we had another bumper crop.

So far we've made masses of Damson Jam, bottles and bottles of Elderberry Cordial and a small mountain of Apple Pies.

Yum Yum.

Our bramble harvest as been not that great either, took us a good couple of hours to get enough for the 6 jars we made last night.

Picked a kg of blackberries the other night, collected another kilo of crab apples from the garden and have a load of rowan berries too. In two minds about whether to try anything with the rowans, from what I've read the seem to be a bit marmite.

how apt, just got back from picking another 2kg of blackberries. Sloes still not ready.