Picking Blackberries for Jam
Picking Blackberries, especially wild blackberries, is not easy. Wendy, from Wendy’s Crafts, shares her Blackberry picking experience to help you understand why Blackberry Jam made from wild blackberries is such a specialty product.
Basics of Picking Blackberries
Blackberries grow in a Blackberry Bramble What is a Bramble? It is an impenetrable thicket. A what? A bramble is made up of intertwined canes lined with nasty nasty thorns. Can’t picture it? It’s like a roll of barbed wire. Still don’t understand? It’s like the mouth of a giant shark lined with five hundred sharpened teeth. You then grow the blackberries on the back row of teeth. The blackberries that Wendy picks for her Blackberry Jam are perfect to pick in February. If they are picked too early, the Jam is awful, tasteless and bitter. If they are picked too late the fruit spoils and impossible to pick. So imagine…..February, Australia, Hot – really HOT, Sunny, Outdoor bramble….no airconditioned blackberry office, no barrista, no shade, just HOT. Then….cover your body in clothing….arms, legs, feet, hands, head, face, the whole lot…now you are really HOT. Then step into a sea of thorns, reaching deeply and start picking the prized blackberries.
Where is the Secret Blackberry Bramble?
Blackberry Bramble
Wendy’s mum, Beth, had a friend, name unknown, who mentioned a wild patch of Blackberry Brambles. Beth was born in Barellan. Beth’s mum, Wendy’s grandmother, tried to discover the location of the patch….unsuccessfully. The family has had a long association with Farmhouse Industries, Tarcutta in New South Wales. Grandchildren had to be driven around and around to confuse them before they were taken to the patch. Wendy, even under pressure of reduced chocolate rations, refused to co-operate. This author has been a valued family friend for 40 years, but NO WAÝ was the response. Humph.
The location where Wendy goes Blackberry picking will have to remain a secret.
How many blackberries are picked to make one jar of jam?
One jar of Wendy’s Blackberry Jam contains approximately 200 blackberries. That is a lot of Blackberry picking! Good preparation, planning, protection and preventative measures are taken. Non-life threatening injuries are normal. Scratches, scratches, scratches and musculo-skeletal overuse. The recovery program is well designed and implemented. No different to a participant in a contact sport! A week later all is resolved.
It is the effort, pain and skill of picking blackberries that adds to the rarity of Wendy’s Crafts Blackberry Jam.
Picking your Own Blackberries
There are commercial Blackberry farms which may allow you to pick your own Blackberries, or you may have access to wild blackberries. If so, please try Wendy’s Blackberry Jam Recipe or if not visit Wendy at her market stall or order online.
