bramble jelly
This is how you do it. First, you pick your brambles.
If possible, pick a lovely, balmy early autumn day, and remember to take a big tupperware box with you. The brambles will stain your hands, clothing, and the box. Just thought I’d warn you..
The best brambles( as everybody knows) are always right at the top of the bush, or right at the bottom, and are surrounded by stinging nettles. Do not let this dissuade you.
If you get a little bored with being prickled, stung or stained wth bramble juice, take a minute or two to look at the scenery…
Or the local wildlife….
Then bring the brambles home and admire them…
Then get out the jelly pan. This has to be a proper jelly/jam making pan. A big saucepan, no matter how big it looks ,is not big enough. Believe me.
Boil up your brambles with a few cooking apples, then strain the mash through a jelly bag. Apparently if you let it drip and do not give the bag a wee sly squeeze every time you pass, you will get a clearer jelly, but who could resist? Not the Landlady.
Then measure the ruby red, fragrant viscous liquid, and allow a kilo of sugar to each 1 and a bit litres of liquid.heat gently, then allow to get to a rolling boil, (which is also what the Big Man is when he’s had too much beer.) Skim, and see if it’s set by putting a wee bit on a saucer. If the surface wrinkles when you draw your finger over it- bingo. Setting point is reached. Pour the hot jelly into sweet little pots purchased from Lakeland. If you have some left over, an empty peanut butter jar is also quite acceptable..well washed, of course…
Now the kitchen , the jelly pan, your hands and possibly the floor will look as if you have had a massacre in there. Clean up, or get your Big Man to clean up by promising acts of kindness and depravity later on.
Enjoy.
September 19th, 2009 at 4:35 am
Absolutely scrumptious.
Sadly blackberries were sprayed in NZ and to actually find some was a minor miracle.
To pick them one had to clamber down steep slopes [where the spray didn't reach]. Please, if you take children with you [anyone under 30 fits this category] make sure there is a rule … two for the bucket, one for the mouth!
Sometimes, if I couldn’t bother waiting for the jelly to drip, I would make jelly-jam, which bypassed the jelly bag routine. A thicker brew, but equally scrumptious, and eminently suitable for jam roly-poly.
Thank you for bringing wonderful memories into the forefront of my thoughts! [I love autumn!]
September 19th, 2009 at 6:59 am
September 19th, 2009 at 8:28 am
As far as i can remember, the best blackberries, were the ones you found
when you had filles your bucket.
September 19th, 2009 at 12:57 pm
thats what pockets of your school raincoat were for when I was wee, Pat!!!
September 19th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
tsk tsk!!! INSIDE BLAZER POCKETS,LL
September 19th, 2009 at 1:54 pm
What a lovely blog landlady. I purrticularly admire ‘ruby-red, fragrant, viscous liquid’. However your purropensity to squeeze what could be misconstrued as another kind of bag is slightly worrying for 49% of the population…well, maybe not all of them, little dears.
It reminds me that just now, fpu has a rather strong urge to squeeze the bawbag of someone who shall remain nameless…
We have a Bramble-picking Rule too - Pick Nothing at Doggy-peeing Height!
September 19th, 2009 at 4:31 pm
Yes I do seem to have a bit of a thing for squeezing bags, of all descriptions, ’tis true FC. Tell me whose bawbag fpu would like to be squelching?? Could it be mpu????
September 19th, 2009 at 8:01 pm
Tcha! Certainly not. A gentle fondle purrhaps…But it could be the nameless purrson who has made it impussible for anyone other than the owner of an ex islandblogger’s blog to gain access to it. The ex-islandblogger list is no more, has fallen aff its perch, is deceased.
Squelch is a very onomatopæic word. I’m purring at passing thoughts as we speak…
September 20th, 2009 at 12:51 am
September 20th, 2009 at 11:27 am
Nice one LL - no brambles round our way so hoping to achieve similar things with rosehips. I love your old skool scales by the way- very nice!
September 20th, 2009 at 1:05 pm
September 20th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
Blackberry jam is best of all with nice gritty pips to crush - unfortunately also lodging between teeth. Stumpy loves blackberries and knows how to pick them herself - gingerly pulling them off the bush lest a stray prickle should prickle her sensitive snout.
September 20th, 2009 at 5:32 pm
Clever Stumpy! I got quite a few prickles and a nettle sting..
September 20th, 2009 at 6:05 pm
My god LL if that is what your old school scales look like—-lucky you-young thing
mine did not look like that: I know what kc/fc is on about 
even after a very nice,polite mail on the subject he is not even polite enough to reply 
September 20th, 2009 at 7:56 pm
September 20th, 2009 at 7:59 pm
September 21st, 2009 at 10:10 am
move over nigella, this is a real domestic goddess!
yyum yum!
September 21st, 2009 at 11:09 am
September 21st, 2009 at 2:43 pm
LL –To hell with her looks(never seen her) but just give us her cash
September 21st, 2009 at 4:31 pm
September 21st, 2009 at 5:46 pm
We here at Number Twenty are purrleased to hear that your Great Leader has done something so very adventurous and f**k-the-recession-ish, and wish him all the best from afar. Maybe the loss of our links is just a temporary blip due to the Captain having left the bridge
Is there a First Officer to keep you all ship-shape and bristols fashion? (Purresent company excepted)
PS Landlady does, in some departments very much resemble the luscious Nigella…
September 21st, 2009 at 6:50 pm
September 21st, 2009 at 7:18 pm
We’ve got the self same scales, acquired from a grandmother’s kitchen. Weights are very much by best guess and a few more raisins can’t hurt attitude!!!
September 21st, 2009 at 8:03 pm
Is it my bristols, Fc? Where I resemble Nigella? I don’t think I want them inspected by any First Officer though…
September 22nd, 2009 at 8:16 am
just by cap’t pugwash
September 22nd, 2009 at 1:03 pm
September 23rd, 2009 at 6:21 pm
Lovely strong paws too…sorry, hands
Quite masterful, but I am more than a match for any mere biped, strong handed or no.
September 23rd, 2009 at 7:43 pm
Cap’n Pugwash and myself are hoping to meet
, either in Millport or Largs, at the start of the Oct hol week- exact date unknown, exact location unknown, as I may only be able to make it a day long visit if Crawford St is rented that week- would you be able to join us , FC’s pus? It would be around the eleventh or twelfth oct?
September 24th, 2009 at 4:45 am
the mind just
at thoughts of such a meeting–i shall ,myself be on an island on the chosen day,but not quite as far north 
September 24th, 2009 at 8:27 am
Under the circumstances a stony silence seems most PC. Is Taddoe trying to make us jealous? Hope a good time is had by all.
September 24th, 2009 at 11:24 am
i ADORE home mad jam and stuff!! i wish i did not live in a city!!!
September 24th, 2009 at 3:05 pm
och c’mon Barney, you can’t manage a stony silence!!!It just ain’t in your nature!
September 24th, 2009 at 8:38 pm
I’m quite purrtial to home mad jam myself
If they’re free landladyland it’s a possybillytee. We just don’t know what we’re doin’ that far ahead due to furniture and jiners and paintin’ and gettin’ shot of bruck and moved and stuff. Guid kens!
But surely you want Cap’n P all to yourself? The High Chaperone…
September 25th, 2009 at 9:17 am
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ss
September 25th, 2009 at 8:11 pm
ss? Are you feelin’ Dotty Cap’n?