It's finally happened ! This year has been a tough one for our fruit and vegetables. We had a cool, wet spring, and temperatures have been consistently about 5 degrees cooler than they should be for the last couple of months. It felt like summer was never going to arrive in the UK. I blame the sunspots....
Finally, this week we've seen proper sunshine instead of the constant cool, overcast weather that has been the norm for the last month or three. At last, the loganberries have started filling out and ripening, about 3 weeks later than they usually do, and we had our first one of the year yesterday !
Here it is, freshly washed in a bowl, ready for my wife to eat 😀
This is one of the loganberry stems, over our compost bed. The photo was taken this morning, and there are already a few more berries ripening nicely.
Loganberries are a hybrid between blackberries and raspberries, and I reckon they're nicer than both of those. The berries are larger than raspberries and deeper in colour, with a richer, sweeter taste.
The problem is that when they ripen, they really need to be picked and eaten that day. They don't store or travel well, which is why you won't find them in supermarkets (other than turned into jam !)
Here's a shot along the fence - you can see a good number of berries, but more are lurking under leaves and in the undergrowth.
The photo above shows our white currants. It's a strange plant this one ! I planted this and a red currant bush when we moved into the house. The red currants were killed when an over-enthusiastic friend tried to help in the garden and pruned them down to ground level, but the white currant bush has thrived. Even if the pigeons did eat the whole crop last year, which is why we put a cage around the bush !
White currants are supposed to be sharp and acidic to the taste, but the ones this makes go a kind of pink colour, and are really, really sweet. The first few should be ready for harvesting by the end of the week, and I'm really looking forward to it !
All photos by me
