Friday 17 June 2011

Bearing fruit...mulberries


Mulberries dropped from a soaring tree by the sheepfold into an obscene river of plenty.
                                                        From The Lantern

The mulberries were just ripening when we were at house two weeks ago for filming, but the gravel and grass underneath the big tree were already spotted with dark pink-purple fruit. By now, they will be a veritable carpet.


They are easier to pick from the weeping mulberry in the garden, though even here the sheer abundance is overwhelming. Longer and thinner than a blackberry, these mulberries have a delicate taste and density, almost like rose petal-infused sugar water.


It’s not that common to find them this side of the great Rhône river. It’s on the other side, in the south-west of France, that the silk industry traditionally cultivated mulberry trees to feed the leaves to silkworms. So we can only guess at the reasons for the presence of these trees around the buildings on our property - another small mystery, along with so many others to set the imagination alight...  


14 comments:

Jyoti Mishra said...

wow that is so great that u have mulberries in your property !!!
Enjoyy Deborah !!!

Anonymous said...

Quelle chance que tu as, Deborah! En capturant ces petites bêtes, tu vas pouvoir te confectionner de magnifiques foulards et chemisiers, et ton mari des cravates modernes. Et le tout made in lantern en bio, naturellement!...

Cornflower said...

Deborah, do you ever turn the mulberries into jam? A friend once gave me a jar (he'd bought, not made), and it was wonderful.

Lynne with an e said...

At last a sighting of that mysterious bush we all used to sing about going around as children! A carpet of berries, though, best not to wear white shoes. Your description of the berry's flavour has now given me a hankering to taste it for myself.

J. M. P. said...

Delicious, I like the way you describe their taste. Whenever I go to the Pyrenees I enjoy picking blackberries along the ways.

Omoy said...

I've never had mulberries before, I don't like that, it seemed as If I should.You make me want to have some:)

Mel said...

Gorgeous pictures and words. I grew up in Brisbane, Australia and remember that we drove Mum mad as small children, because, while the novelty lasted, we filled our bedrooms with upteen shoe boxes housing silkworms, lemony yellow cocoons and mulberry leaves. All courtesy of an emormous mulberry bush that grew in the grounds of the kindergarten. Can you imagine the chaos when all of the cocoons opened, and there were large whitish grey moths everywhere? Poor Mum :)

BookQuoter said...

My mulberries are just starting to bloom. My fruits are so much smaller.
Gorgeous pictures as usual.

Lisa Erin said...

I have never had a mulberry. They sound delicious. When I was young, we would go on blackberry picking walks. On my father's farm he had tons of Dewberry bushes growing in his fields. Those are basically a much larger blackberry that grows on bushes close to the ground. When the berries were ripe, there was always plenty of cobbler to go around.

I wonder if my produce stand has access to Mulberries? Don't know if they grow here or where, but I am on a mission to find out! :)

Anonymous said...

i love mulberry trees. my grandparents had an eden of a backyard that had all sorts of citrus trees, a mulberry trees, a loquat tree, and a gorgeous array of flowers.

as usual, gorgeous pics.

Unknown said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Unknown said...

I love mulberries, they bring me back to my true home. I have yet to eat any store bought mulberries that are nearly as sweet and full of flavor as the ones my brother's and I picked in our backyard. It's one of my oldest wishes to return to pick the berries like I did in my childhood, and my deepest regret knowing that it will never happpen.

James Kiester said...

No matter the reason, it's nice they're there.

Anonymous said...

Quelle chance to have mulberries. Isn't there a mulberry wine? Or at least a mulberry eau de vie???

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