Wild Blackberry Picking

Have you ever tried freshly picked wild blackberries? They are the sweetest thing. So good.

Yesterday on my run, I noticed some wild blackberry bushes along the path behind our house. I normally run by this particular area and think to myself "I wish those people would cut their grass; everything looks so overrun and bushy." It is quite unlike the Germans to let their gardens get overgrown, so this particular area looks kind of out of place. I'm not even sure who the piece of land belongs to; there is no fence around the perimeter.

I've been wanting to make jam using the wild blackberries picked from our backyard. I had picked a good bunch, but I had also been eating one or three here and there and needed some more for my jam. So I ventured out to my "secret" blackberry bush picking area this afternoon as a little break from work. The weather was perfect; I was playing some great tunes on my iPod (check out this link to Jack Johnson. He is from Hawaii and totally rocks. I love his music. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWVnZAJaq4Q&feature=related I also love his song "Upside Down.") The sun was shining and it was a perfect afternoon off to pick wild blackberries in the woods behind our house.

I came across the bush and started picking. Blackberry picking is rather a fine art, as those of you who have experience picking blackberries would know. You need to gently reach in and pluck the ripe berries, without getting pricked by those tiny thorns or shaking the bush too much and making the other berries fall. I thought of so many analogies as I was picking those berries. I had never paid much attention to that overgrown bush. It's not even pretty. But upon closer inspection, I realized that the blackberry bush was so full of beautiful, ripe, blue blackberries. I looked even closer and reached in to pluck the hard-to-reach ones and noticed that there were blackberries everywhere! This bush was enormous! Anyway, I am off to make dinner and get started on making blackberry jam (my first venture in the world of jam making). Hope you are well and enjoying the little things in life around you.

Love, Fi xo