Episode 202: Very Berries

spk_0:   0:00
black blue rasp straw. What does these things have in common?

spk_1:   0:12
Well, been very, very good to me.

spk_0:   0:14
Very, very good to you. Eat very, very good to you. He she who would pun would skew all candy from a child.

spk_1:   0:26
Kid doesn't eat all the candy anyway.

spk_0:   0:28
It's true. Welcome to the show the Berry Berry Good show today. Our topic of discussion is okay, Wait for it. People, Berries. How about that Berries? We're going to talk about Berries now. We have done a little bitty, tiny bit of Berries here in their past Here, in there. We're really gonna hit it today. We're gonna talk about Berries, all kinds of stuff about Berries. And since I have absolutely no idea what we're going to be talking about Barry's I got turned over her because this is all her idea. And we haven't talked about it because

spk_1:   1:03
I've been working with my Berries and what I first started on growing things in my garden. I was a little intimidated by the cane Berries, blackberries, raspberries, all those guys. Because when you read about them, they're always talking about flora canes and primal canes. And how you need to prune, Um, and this and that and the other. It sounded complicated, but we had an old fence line between us and our neighbor that neither the neighbor or we really care about. So I thought, You know what the heck? It's the end of season. The Berries were selling for cheap. So one year about 12 years ago, maybe I just grabbed one of those cheap pots of Berries stuck in the ground and hope for the best and discovered. That's pretty much what you need to do with raspberries,

spk_0:   1:56
at least in our part of the country,

spk_1:   1:58
at least in our home, which is far from a wild blackberries. I'll get back to that in a moment. So turns out all that stuff that they talk about taking care of the Berries. If you want to have a berry patch that looks good and is optimally productive and easiest to pick, you probably need to do all those things. If, on the other hand, you just want to stick something in the ground and then come back every spring or early summer and pick a bunch of Berries and eatem. You don't have to do any of that

spk_0:   2:34
Or, to be fair, watch birds Pick a bunch of your Berries. Yes. So there's that to

spk_1:   2:43
the birds. Like the Berries too. In fact, my first harvest, first harvester. Always puny. My first harvest. We went on a long weekend vacation, right When the Berries came right and the birds got almost all of them,

spk_0:   2:57
we came back and she was like Berries. Huh? I waited

spk_1:   3:01
for those. I watched them grow from little bitty flowers, which are great. Be attractors, by the way, all the way to big, Luscious, almost, but not quite right Berries and then the stinking birds animal before come came back eso about some Birdman netting the next year, and now I toss bird netting over him when the first ones start coming right, and that saves most of them for me or if there are lots and lots of Berries, I don't want it all. Anyway, I say heck with it. Let the birds have a share.

spk_0:   3:32
If we do end up with lots and lots of Berries, like lots of Berries. Yeah, there are aggressive and they grow to be lots of Berries.

spk_1:   3:45
Here's how I found that I really do need to take care of the Berries. Uh, what they the cane Berries, blackberries and raspberries. They sprout these canes, and we're the ends of these canes. Touch the ground. They'll often route and start a new plant there. So while they are still in the arching over, getting ready to touch the ground phase, I snaked him over and let him touch the ground close to the fence where I want the fence line is now essentially buries. The little amount of bad wire in there makes no difference to anybody. The real barrier now is the Berries and the canes, and I just thread the canes in there. What? I want him to take root if the dry ones get annoying and in my way, I cut him off. Otherwise, I'll even there if they sprout over and land somewhere. I don't particularly want the Berries to go. I can either run over him with a lot more, or I can dig him up and play them somewhere else. Because once they have rooted, you can cut the arch. Oh, about 18 inches up from the one you want to dig up beside. You want to dig up which is the new side. Um, take that up and go planet somewhere else. That's where I've got a lot of my berry plantings at the place from Is from the couple of Vines I bought.

spk_0:   5:12
Put it home. So how's that going? It's a place

spk_1:   5:16
at the place. It's, Yeah, some success, some not success. The ground is not very good in the spot where I'm trying to put him for Berries. We have areas at the place that Barry's like very well, and we have areas they don't like is well, and I can't really tell by looking at it what the difference is because we have to ridge tops and one of them, the blackberries that are wild grow really well and abundant, big and tasty. So I go pick him every year, and the other side they grow, but they grow scrawny and small, and the place where I happen to want a fence of living berry is on side where they happen to go scrawny and small. So I planted a variety of different very strains there, seeing what would like the spot, and I'm getting a few Berries off him, and they're spreading a little bit, but not as fast as I'd like. There really is only one of the things they say you have to pay attention to with Berries. That, I found, was absolutely true for me. When it comes to taking care of. If you don't know Berries very well, the difference between blackberries and raspberries it is not color. It's when you pull the berry off. The core of the BlackBerry comes with it, so you got this berry around a little bit of a pith core. When it's a raspberry, you pull off a raspberry. And this how a little cup of Barry comes off in your hand and stem that it grew on stays on the plane. So, raspberries or hollow blackberries or not? Hello, raspberries come in a variety of colors. They've got red ones. They've got golden ones. They've got black ones. The black ones probably have some genetic shared with blackberries because they share a disease pest with blackberries. And if you plant black raspberries anywhere near blackberries, either wild or potentially domestic, no thin like 100 feet or 150 feet, depending on who you talk to. The little plant sucking insects called aphids that feed off the blackberries. They feed off the blackberries, but they don't do him any particular harm. But then they go feed off your black raspberries and they give your black raspberries a viral disease. And I found that completely true because I'd read it. Hey, all this other stuff I wrote about taking care of Berries is wrong. What if I just try it? Because I've got black raspberries at home and I've got a 1,000,000,000 black raspberries at home, and I need to get rid of some of those little sprouts anyway. So it's either mole or try and transplant him. So I'm risking is some labor and I put the labor in and they looked beautiful for about two months. They immediately rooted. They started sprouting new canes. They started flowering, they started growing all over the place. And then we got to late summer. In between one week and the next, almost all of them dried up and died, which probably means they got the viral disease. A few have survived, and they're still Golan and there starting to flower again. So I think I may have selected out the ones that were most resistant to that viral disease. But I lost a bunch of

spk_0:   8:51
So you want to sort of work?

spk_1:   8:54
I lost some work. A lot would be kind of an overstatement.

spk_0:   8:58
And actually, if you want to, you could transplant the ones that are more viral resistant, apparently to the to the place Go me to the location where you had planted the others that tied up.

spk_1:   9:12
Yeah, What I'm doing now is I'm walking him because they're starting to make a long enough canes that cane's We're getting ready to touch the ground, and I'm just touching him into the ground along the same fence line in the direction I want them to expand. And those raspberries, once they got going at home, were so prolific. I have to, um, clipping back just because I want some BlackBerry, some raspberries and some grapes along that fence line

spk_0:   9:41
coupon back so we can get in the back door, which is 50 feet.

spk_1:   9:46
They're not that bad. If I didn't care about those other Berries, I wouldn't have to do anything except Mo is far in. As I want to not have more plants spring up, they'll be all right. But I do want those other Berries. So I cut the raspberries enough to give the blackberries some space and give the grapes some space. By the way, that's what I did with the grapes, too. Bought some grapes, stuck him in the ground, jumped back and have been having a profusion of grapes for years and years ever since. I don't take any particular care of him. The last couple of years I've gotten some compost mulch in a truckload throw, most of it on the garden. I've given him a few shovel fulls just to show show my care. And when I put wood mulch down so I don't have to weed so much, I've been tossed in some of it under the binds. Just so there's not as many nasty, uh, weeds in my way. When I go to pick my Berries,

spk_0:   10:52
you're driving past plowed ground. That's such an unusual sight anywhere.

spk_1:   10:56
They don't go out

spk_0:   10:57
much clouded in North Missouri anymore. It's almost all the hotel, So, yeah, what's the problem, she said, with their but with like her grapes are she planted him pretty close toe. One of her other Berries, that kind of kind of fighting it out. It turns out she planted a seed of a strain of Concord called The Grapes of Wrath. They're always at war with their neighbors,

spk_1:   11:25
but they make.

spk_0:   11:27
I don't think those kids need candy either. Yeah. So we got raspberries, We got strawberries, We got grapes, we grow them. We go out with their white bucket because we use a white bucket. I don't know why we use a white bucket. We use a white buckeye. When I do it, I always use a stainless steel bucket. The

spk_1:   11:50
White book. It's a bigger So if I think I have

spk_0:   11:52
I was like the statements to one because it look shiny er

spk_1:   11:55
and it washes nicer. So if I think the low fit in the stainless steel bucket, I take that. But otherwise I take one of the white ones

spk_0:   12:02
because something we go out and we get it and we bring it in. And then what do we do with it? We've got all these Berries. We've got all these grapes. What are we going to do with them? I

spk_1:   12:14
am not much of a canner. I just don't have that much time in the summer. I have this job thing, and then I have the other garden stuff going on,

spk_0:   12:23
and we, when we travel, we do tend to travel in the summer. So we do have a week or two were gone, and it's often at a prime time for this. So

spk_1:   12:33
yes, so I don't do a whole lot of canning with him. But I will freeze some because I really like him frozen in there easy and convenient to put away that way. And they're easy and convenient to eat that way. But if the power goes out, you lose. Everything is frozen, so I offer you some and some of them I make fruit leather with like my raspberries. If it's been a dry year, they tend to be kind of small and not terribly juicy. So I make they make pretty good fruit leather. I throw a bunch of them in a blender, blend them up, spread them out on a piece of waxed paper on top of my dehydrator trays, dry him down

spk_0:   13:21
and make sure you get him dry. Yep, you gotta make sure they're leather gets dry.

spk_1:   13:26
Otherwise, it molds. If it's not dry enough, it molds and cut it into strips. Roll the strips up with the wax paper still around it, so it doesn't all stick to itself. Stick it in Mason jars, tossing a couple oxygen absorbers. Apply a vacuum seal,

spk_0:   13:43
as we can see from our post that just recently posted on three B Y and a podcast

spk_1:   13:50
that you're feeling. That's one of the things I do with it. Um,

spk_0:   13:57
no, we don't.

spk_1:   13:57
For the grapes, I blend up the grapes and running through a strainer to get out the seeds and the big, chunky pieces of pope. That leaves a bunch of fine pieces of pope in all the Jews and I just to put that into some ice cube trays, freeze little cubes of grape juice. And then I use it that way because I haven't gotten into the winemaking groove yet. But that's that's something that's on my list. Try fairly soon, because I've always got more Concord grape juice. Didn't know what to do with.

spk_0:   14:36
Okay, well, here's the thing. We don't grow. We don't have a big blueberry patch. Blueberries are kind of a different deal.

spk_1:   14:47
They need soil that's more acidic than everything else likes.

spk_0:   14:50
But what we do have is we have a local blueberry patch. For people who do this, this is their fangs.

spk_1:   14:57
It's a U pick place.

spk_0:   14:58
It's a U pick place, and she she's a locust.

spk_1:   15:02
Hits them hard. They know the remember me year to year, because one I love blueberries. I can sit and eat those suckers by the handful, and they're exceptionally helpful for you to which is a bonus. So I eat him by the lots when they're right,

spk_0:   15:23
blueberries or what they call a superfood because they've just got so much good stuff in the morning. So many, actually. Any accidents and vitamins and minerals and and they're just super food.

spk_1:   15:36
And for those of you who prefer the low carb diets, all these Berries we've been talking about are fairly low carb fruits. Yeah, they've got some fruit sugars, but they don't go crazy with the fruit sugars except the grapes.

spk_0:   15:48
Yeah, plenty Cape can get pretty pretty shrieked.

spk_1:   15:53
Yeah, but the rest of them considered fairly low carb Berries, especially the blackberries and raspberries. The blueberries just have so much good going on, too. I free some of them and I dried blueberries. The raspberries were disappointing when I dried them. I couldn't find a way to dry them and have them still nice and tasty when I ate, um, later. They're always disappointing. Although they worked, they were good. So I kind of gave up on that. Except the fruit leather is pretty good, But the blueberries First time I tried to dry those. I ran that sucker for a full day and they still weren't dry because the skin of the blueberry is designed to keep moisture in. So I read up on it and say, Okay, you gotta Blanche the blueberries. You gotta dip and briefly in boiling water, and then you dip mint ice water, and then you drive him like, Okay, that sounds like more of a hassle, but I'll give it a try. I tried it. Worked a little better, but still not great. Then I hit upon Wells. The problem is that there skins are not letting the water out. I'm gonna take these suckers not gonna squish him, and then I'm gonna put him out of my trays so I can either pinch the Berries is I put him down two just split the skins or I put a bunch of Mona flat tray and put another flat tray on top of him and pushed down toe squish the whole lot. As long as you got a nice split in the skin of each berry, they'll dry in a reasonable amount of time. Now, those guys you don't want to take all the way to crispy dry because they lose flavor. But they also didn't mold when I took him to just leathery and I vacuum sealed them. Is that usually Do I let it sit a year to see how well they were gonna sit? I tried eating them, and they're good that way. So now I dry some blueberries every year,

spk_0:   18:02
a lot of her Berries end up on cereal. Yep. Um, a lot of her various end up on another superfood oatmeal. Yep, she could smarter Greul. If they

spk_1:   18:16
are dried, either leather or whole, you could make what they call a compote, which means you get the dried Berries in a little dish. You add a little bit of oil and water to him. You let him sit there for like, 10 minutes and and rehydrate in the O water that was boiling when you put it in there and you got this thickened, chunky fruit stuff that Isolde Com Pote

spk_0:   18:42
Blueberry Soup Yeah, chunky blueberry soup.

spk_1:   18:46
You could put that directly on pancakes. If you're that way, I've been known to put it on top of peanut butter on bread.

spk_0:   18:55
It's almost a jellyfish, almost not quite

spk_1:   18:57
without added sugar. Sweet. Uh huh. I like it better on radio.

spk_0:   19:03
It's got It's got more of a tart taste to it. I've had this before. My mom used to make it run. Yeah, it has kind of a tart taste to it. Not really tart, but it's kind of hard to describe.

spk_1:   19:14
Yeah, American tastes air pretty tuned to high sugar, and this is kind of sweet, but it's also got tartness of the fruit natural to it, and there's not extra sugar added to overwhelm that. So it's kind of sweet, but not overwhelmingly sweet. And it's still got the tart tangy. I like it myself, and I make tea and a lot of times in the morning, and I like my keys flavored, and it just dropped some dehydrated Berries or Berries that are frozen or little chunks of fruit leather or whatever, Sandy, drop that in when I pour the hot water in to make the tea. And then I've got raspberry tea, your blueberry tea or something like that. You could drink it hot. You can cool it down and have a nice, later nice flavoring without added sweetener. You also can use it to make pies and things. But I'm not a big baker, so I don't now. Strawberries are a different kettle of fish. They're perennials, though. So which plants? Robbers. You can keep picking on him. And they will also send out runners and sprout down new plans to fill out the area where you let him grow. But I found a lovely trick for strawberries, which is why I want to bring him up first. They do dry down. Nice. You could drive, and you could make a fruit compote out of him later. But the pain about strawberries is the slicing. Because if you're gonna dehydrate him, you gotta slice him first. And a lot of times, if you're gonna freeze him, you want to slice him first. Get out your egg slicer. The one for your boiled eggs. You put the strawberry in the egg slicer and ah, close the top. Turn it down. Upside down over the place you're trying to collect your Berries. Squish it closed. You sliced that whole berry up. One move. Good to know. Then you could pull out slices and lame on the dryer tray, worrying a little bit of, ah, juice in the bottom which somehow never gets further than my lips. That I know how that happens.

spk_0:   21:36
You can also use a food processor. Of course, you have just d top this thing. I'm just thinking. Oh, you're stupid, dog. We had a dog, so dump the start was just dumb. Is oppa sweet nature dog, Great dog, Wonderful dog. But Thomas opposed the space to be sitting there eating strawberries available. This dog be staring there, going 00 that's human food. It's gonna be good. It's gonna be good. I have some have some. She'd give the dog the strawberry top

spk_1:   22:12
and the dog would eat anything else I handed to her. If I was eating it, she would eat it. That was her rule. But when I had strawberries, I didn't feed her the strawberries. I like my strawberries not gonna feed him the dog. She doesn't appreciate him properly. She eats anything elite. Oh, give you a tip,

spk_0:   22:30
tops little top of

spk_1:   22:33
that, eat the rest of strawberry and handed the top and should take it like it was a real prize and should mumble it around in her mouth for a minute. And then you should get this disappointed look on her face. Like, what's this? Kind of dropped the strawberry top and look at me like you didn't give me human food, did you? That's not what you're eating, is it? You got something better there, don't you? Well, with the strawberry Tubbs,

spk_0:   22:56
this this darkness, they're dumb that you just take her dog food. Her dry dog food way. Federer, Try dog that. We sent it out. You could eat as much as she wanted. She was Certainly She was actually very fit dog, But you'd pick it up, act like it was a treat, man. She bill she go nuts to get it, But she didn't. She thinks she'd be getting special.

spk_1:   23:18
Give it to her one piece at a time. It became apprised.

spk_0:   23:21
She wasn't. She was a a darker color dog. So And she was in no wave, right? Not even an hour. Good dog low. Yeah. Yeah, We had her 16 and 1/2 years. She was a good one. Anyway, I thought that was like even she wasn't dumb enough to strawberry tops.

spk_1:   23:41
You can use the ah food processor to make strawberry leather. I tried it to slice up to dehydrate, and they're a little bit soft. I don't have a really high end food processor. I got a generic, fairly low end version, which is fine for my needs. But it at least did not slice them cleanly enough for dehydrating nicely.

spk_0:   24:12
So some of the nice ones can do. Really? Yes. We're not gonna pay that kind of money where she's She's got a thing about countertop appliances. She doesn't likethe um

spk_1:   24:22
I don't have very much countertop,

spk_0:   24:25
but she

spk_1:   24:25
said I have to be on a strict diet. Of what countertop appliances

spk_0:   24:29
are countertop appliances. Really? Huh. Her boiler. Just boiler

spk_1:   24:37
Instant, but and hot water Kettle

spk_0:   24:42
hot water kettle. That's what your boiler thing? Because she wakes up long before I do. And she doesn't wanna wake me up by making a lot of cooking's house and then you got the toaster, which has the egg cooker in it, and that's about it. But everything else gets put away. I mean, we've got a blender. We gotta, you know, but it's all gets put away.

spk_1:   25:03
I don't want any more stuff generally, that I can fit on top of the refrigerator, because that's my storage spot that I can pull down easily. After that, it starts to get to be a lot of work to pull stuff out,

spk_0:   25:14
prepping in an insta part. We could do it in stewpot probing Now it doesn't sound like much of a prepper are prepping thing, but it is because it helps you quickly eat your prep food. It may not help you in an actual prepping situation, but it helps you rotate through your food very quickly, and it keeps you healthy. So a

spk_1:   25:37
fast way to a lot of times. The dehydrated who takes a long cooking time otherwise, well, both the rehydrate, and

spk_0:   25:46
we'll consider that you may hear you may see a post in a podcast on it on the instant pot at some point in time, because it's look, it's pretty cool. So can you think of anything else we need to add to the Berries?

spk_1:   26:02
No, I think I need to. Can't really pick any yet today They're just starting to ripen on me. The earliest ones are so we'll just have to let it sit for now.

spk_0:   26:13
All right, well, we're gonna catch you later. So thank you for listening to us and we'll catch you next time.