Feasting on foraged fruits

There’s something magical about the change in the seasons, especially when the morning chill of autumn gives way to warm sunny days, clear skies and the prospect of spending time outdoors unencumbered by waterproof coats, gloves and woolly hats. It was beautiful in Dorset this weekend, which gave me the chance to enjoy one of my favourite autumn days out: blackberry picking. Some of my earliest memories are of family walks spent searching for fruit in the hedgerows, trying to resist the temptation to eat the berries and instead fill our plastic pots. We didn’t have a freezer in the seventies, so our harvests went into pies and crumbles, jams and jellies and, in a really good year, blackberry wine.

The blackberry is one of my favourite fruits. I love the colour, I love the shine on its individual spheres (they’re called druplets, I’ve just found out!) and I love the way they yield their juice so easily, staining fingers and lips alike. I also love the fact that these beautiful berries, which we can pick for free, are unbelievably good for you.

Blackberries are packed full of nutrients, from folate to flavonoids. It’s the flavonoids which make them so special; they are an excellent source of anthocyanins, which give them their purple colour and also have powerful anti-oxidant properties. One scientific study put the humble blackberry top of the table in terms of anti-oxidants per serving, with around twice as many as cranberries and blueberries[1].

So what’s so special about anti-oxidants? Very simply, they help combat the oxidative stress put on the body by free radicals. We all produce free radicals (when exercising or as a result of inflammation, for example), but if there’s an imbalance between them and anti-oxidants, it can lead to all sorts of problems, including damage to DNA and cell membranes. It’s been linked to cardiovascular disease, neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s, respiratory conditions and some cancers[2]. The trouble is, we are exposed to free radicals all the time, through air pollution and UV light. Eating lots of coloured fruit and vegetables, as well as herbs and spices, which are rich in anti-oxidants is thought to play a protective role, and is linked to a reduction in risk for developing serious health conditions, such as heart disease and diabetes[3].

If that wasn’t enough, blackberries have lots more vitamin K (needed for blood clotting) than other berries (nearly 20 µg/100 g, compared with around 8 µg for raspberries and just 2 µg for strawberries[4]) and just one serving would give you more than a third of your recommended daily intake of vitamin C. Folate, used in the formation of healthy red blood cells, is usually associated with green vegetables, and while blackberries, with 34 µg/100g can’t compete with broccoli (which has 72 µg/100 g serving), they are more than a match for peas, which have only 31 µg/100 g[5].

It’s no surprise then, that blackberries have been used in traditional medicine for centuries. Blackberry cordials and syrups have been prescribed for their restorative powers, used to treat coughs and colds and even given to ease arthritis[6]. The leaves are also said to have medicinal properties; the father of modern medicine, Hippocrates, recommended an infusion of blackberry leaves to aid childbirth and here in Britain blackberry-leaf poultices were used to treat ulcers and abscesses. Their effectiveness is backed up by science too: the leaves have been shown to have significant antimicrobial activity against several strains of bacteria, including E-coli and Salmonella typhi[7].

Best of all, blackberries are delicious and versatile! You can eat them raw, on their own or added to plain yogurt ( I love to watch the colour bleed out, gradually turning the white a delicate purple). They’re perfect in pies, mouthwatering in muffins and make a great topping for cheesecakes. If you have time, you can make jam or fruit compôte and there are plenty of recipes online for blackberry cordials, liqueurs and wines, which may be reason enough to tempt you outside!

You don’t have to pick your own blackberries of course. You can buy them fresh or frozen from most supermarkets, ready to throw into a smoothie or add to porridge for a healthy breakfast. In fact, research shows the cultivated varieties have more anti-oxidants than their wild cousins[8], so you’ll be getting even more of those valuable nutrients.

I would still rather battle the thorns and the stinging nettles to pick blackberries myself. My hands are covered in scratches after yesterday’s endeavours, but it was worth it to bring home enough to make an apple and blackberry crumble and have some left over for another day. I’m not sure what I’ll make next, but I do know I will savour every mouthful, knowing my foraged fruit doesn’t just look and taste great, it’s doing me good too.

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[1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16825686/ [2] https://www.hindawi.com/journals/omcl/2017/8416763/ [3] https://www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/10/8/1089/htm [4] https://nutritiondata.self.com/ [5] https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/composition-of-foods-integrated-dataset-cofid [6] https://www.eatweeds.co.uk/bramble-blackberry-rubus-fruticosus [7] https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3921/5/2/17/htm [8] https://www.notulaebotanicae.ro/index.php/nbha/article/view/10993/8129