Tag: blackcurrants

Anticipation

Looking forward to something can be better than the event itself. However, I’m looking at my roses which are beginning to flower and producing heaps more buds. It’s amazing how fast they have grown after being pruned back in July. I’m pleased to find that they weren’t blown to smithereens by last night’s wild wind.

Name unknown. We call it ‘big bloomer’. Beyond it, Precious Platinum also has many buds.
Cecile Brunner

The globe artichokes have lots of buds this year; usually there are only two or three. While the blackcurrant flowers were barely noticeable, the developing fruit is more obvious and looks promising. The lime tree, which I feared was dying, is now producing new leaves. My neighbour says it may be wise to remove the flowers to give it a better chance of survival.

Globe artichokes
Blackcurrant
Recovering lime tree

Clematis montana is in full flower, and hierloom green rose ‘Viridiflora’ to the left is covered in buds. The garden will be enjoying the rain which we had been hoping for. The temperature has dropped and snow is falling further south. Felix commandeered Mum’s chair beside the fire last night and again this morning.

A new Westerland rose, kindly given to me to replace the one which died, seems to be happy socialising with other roses, and has several buds. I am planning where to plant it, which requires removing the stump of its predecessor which I had hoped might regenerate, but no such luck. Now there is the new rose to look forward to.

A fruitful new year

The 2024 diary is full and closed, the 2025 one open and empty. Underneath, a garden diary has a few entries from during the year. I’ll use it again, overwriting in a different colour so I can compare.

Today I picked a large bowl of blackcurrants. This time I picked some rhubarb to go with them and made a crumble, combining various recipes including some online where I discovered there is an International Blackcurrant Association (IBA). It recommends the rhubarb and blackcurrant combination and, after eating our dessert, we do too.

Berry time of year

The blackcurrants have been ripening over the last few weeks. Now they are ready to pick. Blackcurrants may be an acquired taste for some as they are quite tart. Blueberries are much sweeter and I’ve harvested two large bowls from one bush.

We had our first lot in a shortcake, and I added blueberries for interest.

Before the top layer of pastry was put on.

Then I looked for a more interesting recipe and found one for Blackcurrant and vanilla cream tart. This has a pastry base and a filling of egg yolk, caster sugar, vanilla, and double cream. I used half yoghurt and half cream which probably added to the tartness of the fruit. Delicious.

Because the recipe used three separated eggs, I used the whites to make meringues which I’ve never made before. They turned out well and are nice to eat on the side of the tart with a spoonful of cream and a sprinkling of fresh berries.

There’s still one more blackcurrant bush to harvest. I picked a few of the currants this evening. They are large, juicy, tart and bursting with goodness.