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A Hedgerow Harvest Worth Waiting For

By the middle of August the hedgerows along country lanes begin to bow under their own weight. There is nothing quite like the smell of a warm blackberry thicket on a still afternoon, or the particular sting of a thorn dragging across the back of your hand. For generations of British families, late summer blackberrying was less a hobby than a seasonal duty, and the jam made from the haul was autumn itself, stored in glass.

Our ancestors hedged the fruit about with superstition. In many counties it was said that the devil spat on blackberries after Michaelmas on 29 September, and that anything picked after that date belonged to him. Some told it that he fell from heaven into a bramble bush and cursed it every year in revenge. The advice was sound even if the reasoning was not: by October the fruit is rain-sodden, mouldy and full of grubs. Pick early, pick dry, and use what you gather.

Picking Well: What to Look For

A few minutes spent choosing fruit properly will save you an hour at the pan.

• Colour and give. The sweetest berries are dull, deep black and come away from the stem with the gentlest tug. Anything that resists, or shows a purple-red patch at the core, needs another week.
• Dry weather. Pick once the dew has lifted and the hedges are dry. Wet fruit dilutes the jam and moulds quickly.
• Avoid the roadside. Verges beside busy roads catch spray and exhaust; walk a field's width in if you can.
• Take a mix. Small, sharp, wild berries give the best flavour, but a handful of softer, sweeter ones balances them.

Apples and the Question of Pectin

Blackberries are a low-pectin fruit. Left alone they will produce a loose, syrupy preserve that never quite firms up, however long you boil it. Apples solve the problem. Cooking apples in particular are rich in pectin, the natural gelling agent found in the cell walls of fruit, and they bring a background sharpness that lifts the blackberry's musky sweetness.

Roughly a quarter of your fruit weight in apple is enough to set a blackberry jam reliably. Under-ripe fruit contains more pectin than ripe fruit, so if your blackberries are bursting-soft, lean on slightly firm apples. A squeeze of lemon does more than sharpen the flavour: acid helps pectin set, so a generous tablespoon per kilogram of fruit is worth adding.

The Recipe

This makes about five to six 340g jars.

• 1kg blackberries, picked over
• 750g cooking apples, peeled, cored and sliced
• 1kg granulated sugar
• Juice of one lemon
• 150ml water

Put the blackberries, apple and water into a large, heavy-based pan. Simmer gently for 15–20 minutes, stirring now and then, until the apple has collapsed and the fruit is soft. Take the pan off the heat, add the sugar and stir until every grain has dissolved — you will feel the gritty scrape at the bottom of the pan disappear. Add the lemon juice, then bring back to a hard, rolling boil and keep it there for 10–15 minutes, stirring often to stop it catching.

Hitting the Setting Point

Guessing the set is where most good jam goes wrong, so test rather than hope. Put a small saucer in the freezer before you start. Spoon a little jam onto the chilled saucer, let it sit for a minute, then push it with your fingertip. If the surface wrinkles and the jam holds its shape, it is ready. If it slides about, boil for another three minutes and test again.

A sugar thermometer is quicker still: jam sets at roughly 104–105°C. Do not be tempted to boil far beyond that in search of a firmer set, as you will only drive off flavour and end up with something closer to fruit leather. Remember that the jam thickens further as it cools, so pull it off the heat while it still looks a shade looser than you want.

Sterilising Jars and Storing Your Jam

Clean jars are not optional. Wash them in hot soapy water, rinse well, and dry them in a low oven at about 140°C for 15 minutes, or run them through the hottest dishwasher cycle and leave them there until needed. Lids need scalding too. Fill the jars while both jam and glass are hot, using a jug or a ladle and funnel, leaving a bare half centimetre of headroom.

Wipe the rims, seal immediately, and let the jars cool undisturbed overnight before labelling. A wax disc laid on the surface is traditional but rarely necessary if the seal is good. Store somewhere cool and dark; the jam will keep for at least a year, though the flavour is brightest in the first few months. Once opened, keep it in the fridge.

Eat it on hot toast, ripple it through yoghurt, or spoon it over a baked apple on a cold evening. Either way, you have bottled a September hedgerow, and it will taste of sunshine and thorns for the rest of the winter.