I Gotta Pick the Raspberries....

Remember that old Dunkin Donuts commercial, with the guy who kept saying "It's time to make the doughnuts". Well, it's raspberry season. Every day, I find myself saying, "It's time to pick the raspberries".

This is our own personal patch, so it's a bit uneven, and you have to climb around some obstacles too. But, if any of you are in the mood for raspberries, come on out. You can pick and keep whatever you pick. It would be nice to have a day off...

Don't worry - our new patch is in a nice, flat, open field. That is one of the lessons we learned.

You gotta start somewhere

This is a picture of our new pasture / orchard. I know, it's not very exciting. But, we do have grass growing. In the upcoming weeks, we'll plant the nursery stock and add more fencing for new pastures.

The tree in the foreground is one of the peach trees we planted last year. The blossoms are a good sign, and we may have a crop next year!

Now what?

We are about to embark on the next step of our adventure at Offbeat Acres. There are 20+ trees and a whole pile of raspberry bushes waiting to be planted. Thankfully, they are dormant bareroot nursery stock, so time is on our side (for a few weeks, anyway). We've had to wait for the ground to dry out too.

So, if any of you need something to do this weekend, head on out....and bring a shovel!

Attack of the Mulberries

A few years ago, we discovered a mulberry tree growing in the fence line across the field. The mulberries were sweet, and delicious to eat right off the tree. So, the next spring, my husband took a cutting of the tree to plant in our yard. He lovingly tended it and watered it for a while. Then, one day, it fell victim to the lawn mower (ouch). We were crushed.

A few weeks later, we made a startling discovery: there were mulberry trees already in the yard. (I told you, we're city kids). One of the trees was at least 12 feet tall, and loaded down with fruit. There was another tree growing next to it, and one next to our old stone building, and behind the house. Now that I know what they look like, I see them everywhere! They're almost as bad as the purple coneflowers...


Here's my very own recipe for Berry Lemon Cobbler. The first time I made it, my husband wrinkled his nose...until he tried it. The tartness of the lemon plays perfectly off the sweetness of the mulberries.

Ingredients:
1 whole lemon
3 tbsp white sugar
2 1/2 - 3 cups berries
3/4 cup brown sugar (if using a tarter berry like blueberries, increase to 1 cup)
1 3/4 cup biscuit mix
3/4 cup milk
2 tsp vanilla
1/4 cup white sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Zest lemon into small bowl. Add 3 tbsp white sugar, stir to combine, and set aside.
Pour berries into 8 x 8 pan. (Berries should cover bottom of pan completely)
Sprinkle brown sugar evenly over berries
Squeeze remainder of lemon evenly over berry / sugar mix
Stir together biscuit mix, milk, vanilla, and 1/4 cup white sugar. Batter will be stiff.
Drop batter by the spoonful (a spring loaded ice cream scoop is perfect) over the berry / sugar mix in pan. You should have 10 - 12 spoonfuls.
Sprinkle lemon zest / sugar mix over the top of the batter.
Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes, or until golden brown.

Delicious served warm with whipped cream.

To Spray or Not To Spray

I'm a gardener. Well, first and foremost, I LOVE to eat....and cook. It's so much fun to go out in the garden every day and see what's ripe and is ready for picking / canning / freezing / jam. Last week, we were eating mulberries and radishes. This week, it's raspberries and tomatoes.

People always ask if we're "going organic". I truthfully don't know how to answer that. My growing philosophy is simple: I don't plant anything that needs to be coddled. I plant it, water it, and say "good luck to you". I do occasionally weed, but that's about it.

I think we ingest enough nasty stuff already, through the air and water, so I don't put chemicals on my food. We've had decent luck with our fruit with that philosophy. Yes, our peaches were a little buggy last year, but we still had a plentiful yield. We also had significant hail damage with our apples this year, but no spray in the world will help that. The raspberries don't seem to mind at all.



However, our bottom line is derived from a much simpler place: my boys. They go out in the yard, pick something off the vine / tree / bush, and in the mouth it goes. They love to eat vegetables (even broccoli and asparagus) because they watch it grow (and probably helped along the way). I never want to lose that freedom.