The Forager's Feast

Nature's bounty never ceases to amaze me. A few days ago I picked apples with which to make crabapple jelly and apple cider vinegar. Today while biking in the Pennfield area the wild blueberry fields were a beautiful crimson. Although the commercial harvest is complete there were still sweet berries to be had along the old rail trail. Also spotted some cranberries in the same neighborhood and some ground blackberries while checking out a geocache.

Over the last few days I have picked 10 grocery bags full of Elderberries, 5 of which were thanks to the help of my hubby when we stopped during a bike ride to pick from a bush we are calling the mother lode of all Elderberry bushes. Easy picking indeed and so my new favorite spot! I had already made a pretty good haul from my previous favorite spot where there are lots of bushes but they are unfortunately starting to be choked out by bur cucumbers ( non edible). Harveste...d a few wild apples and some wild grapes while out with hubby and spotted some nice highbush cranberries. I have been frantically trying to get all those Elderberries processed as there are still more to be picked! I have made several batches of juice some of which will go into cordial; some will go into the freezer. I have also dried some in my dehydrator. Today I will use some to make a "shrub drink" . I will use some of the apples to make my own Apple Cider Vinegar for use in shrubs, something I have never done before. Some of the bags of berries, still on the stems, have gone directly into the freezer. This is the perfect way to deal with berries destined to be used for juice as the freezing makes them really easy to de-stem. See more

Yesterday I checked off another item from my "Things to do with milkweed" list. I added the immature pods to my stir-fry. Yummy! On Saturday I checked out my favorite Elderberry patch, picked just a few, and figure the picking will be pretty good by mid-week. Have discovered some BlackBerry canes along the power lines behind my house where the shady conditions have produced some very nice berries. I will be busy!

The bunchberries are ripe. Many people call these snake berries and think they are poisonous, but they are not. They are edible but have a very non-descript bland taste, but contain lots if natural pectin. I have A Raspberry Syrup (delicious on pancakes) recipe which calls for their addition as the thickening agent.

Today I was pleasantly surprised to come across these ripe blackberries while out geocaching. The ones on my property are not even close to being ripe and probably won't be this large. I am looking forward to making a spiced BlackBerry "shrub" . I already did that with some frozen blackberries and it was tasty but I am pretty sure that the result will be superior when using fresh berries.

This is a great year for Wild Raspberries and I am so glad about that as I have discovered that Raspberry is a favorite amongst the "shrub" drinks that I have been making. The first batch that I made I used more than the recommended 1 part berries. It was 2 part berries, then 1 part sweetener and 1 part Apple Cider Vinegar. For the sweetener I used 1/2 raw honey and 1/2 Agave. Delicious. Wanting to have something that is zero calories I made a batch today using commercial... powdered Stevia as a sweetener. See pictures below. If this works out well my next batch will be with the Stevia I have growing in my garden. It won't be as pretty because of it's green color but aesthetics aren't that important to me. It was a great year for Elderflowers as I discovered new picking sites and tried a few new recipes including syrup ( thicker and sweeter than my cordial), Elderflower infused gin (delicious with sparkling water or tonic and a lime wedge), Elderflower vinegar and Elderflower Liquer (not quite ready to be used) and Elderflower Champagne. The champagne was a very fun & educational thing to make as I learned that Elderflowers, picked at the right time, have a lot of natural yeast. The recipe made 5- 750 ml bottles. I took 2 to a 60th birthday party for my neighbor. It got good reviews from those in attendance. See more

Aah, the sweet fragrance of Elderflowers in bloom is filling my yard. The milkweeds along the Lincoln Trail are in full bloom. Time to dig out the recipe for the syrup I made last year and used in a lovely cocktail called "Butterfly Kiss" . Delicious if you like really sweet drinks.