In the past couple of days it’s occurred to me that perhaps blackberries are a bit like sweet pea – that is, the more you pick, the more there are..
I picked every visible blackberry in my jungle of a garden last week (see my blogpost https://eatingforireland.com/2018/08/08/blackberry-time/), and they’re all dozing happily in the freezer, awaiting their moment of glory when I combine them with some cooking apples and a buttery crumble topping for our traditional ‘non-Christmassy’ dinner on Christmas Eve. Imagine my surprise yesterday when I was confronted by easily as many ripe blackberries again, in my carefully cultivated (ahem) blackberry bushes, front and back.
To ignore them would have been well, rude, so I gathered them up (again) and this time they were used for immediate gratification.. drumroll please… Apple and Blackberry Pie! The fact that the first of the Armagh cooking apples were in St George’s Market at the weekend (£2 for a huge bag!) was probably just a coincidence, but perhaps in cookery there are no coincidences! The happy marriage of apples and blackberries – dressed today in a buttery short-crust pastry – is a magical but short-lived late summer treat.
Ready for the oven, with my distinctly amateurish efforts at decoration!
40 minutes later! bring on the custard, or cream..
If you can manage it at all, I’d encourage you and the family to get out into the fresh air and pick some blackberries while they’re at their best. If you can get your hands on some local cooking apples, all the better. The pie literally throws itself together – a layer of pastry at the bottom, chucks of peeled apples, topped with your carefully washed and dried Blackberries, some more apple, and a generous helping of sugar, topped with the rest of the pastry. Don’t forget about the glory of a good crumble https://eatingforireland.com/recipe/apple-and-raspberry-crumble/ – the recipe in the link is for apple and raspberry, but the crumble quantities are suitable for everything.
Even if you don’t fancy/can’t be bothered making your own pastry, ready-made will do very nicely; although my own pastry https://eatingforireland.com/recipe/my-easy-short-crust-pastry/ is relatively stress-free and, I have to say, very nice indeed!
Now the only question is – is two slices too many? Answers on a postcard please 😉
I started writing down recipes in an old copybook when I was about 16. With 6 children at home, my Mother was always glad of a hand in the kitchen, and really allowed us to experiment - as long as we washed up afterwards, and left the kitchen immaculate! Having a tidy kitchen has followed me through my life, as has the habit of writing down my favourite recipes; except that these days I write them for my website, and add photographs when I can. The website really started when it occurred to me that my daughter might like to have these recipes when I've forgotten them. In my early days of cooking for family and friends, I used to phone my Mum all the time to ask her for the recipe for some of our favourite family dinners. She rarely had a recipe to hand - I think, like me, she made a lot of it up as she went along.. So welcome to Eating for Ireland - these are the recipes that my friends and family having been eating these past 40 years.. yes, I truly am ancient! They are tried and tested, and have worked for me for all that time - I have updated them as new ingredients became available - I really hope you'll find something that you can make into a family favourite of your own. You don't have to tell anyone where you found these great new dishes that you're serving up - it can be our little secret, but I'd really love it if you could give me a sneaky 'follow' on Facebook and Instagram.. So off you go - have a good rummage around, you're bound to find something new! My sincere thanks to all of you who have found a recipe that you liked and dropped me a line to tell me - I really do love to hear from you! Happy Cooking! Becks xx