Blackberries vs Brambles: an annual argument

Early Hedgerow Blackberries

The blackberries are early this year. I noticed the first one or two turning black in the hedgerow this week — a good few weeks ahead of schedule, by my reckoning. Not that it should be a surprise, given the heat we’ve had. Everything else seems to have been early too. Or perhaps I’m simply paying more attention.

Which brings us, as it does every year around this time, to the argument.

Blackberries vs Brambles: An Old Argument

My wife calls them brambles. I call them blackberries. My position, which I hold with the confidence of a man who knows he is right, is that the bramble is the plant and the blackberry is the fruit. You don’t call a raspberry a “cane”. Google agrees with me. Her position is that they are brambles, full stop, and always have been. I don’t know if this is a Scottish thing or simply a family tradition that has calcified into fact, but her family call them brambles too, which makes it three against one whenever her parents are visiting. I lose this argument every year and every year I bring it up again anyway.

We also disagree on when they are at their best. I like mine picked straight off the hedge, firm and properly tart, sharp enough to make you wince slightly before you decide you’re having another. My wife prefers hers sweeter and softer, a little further along. We find there is a genuine pleasure in foraging for food. Purple-stained fingers are all part of the fun. They’re good for you as well, as it happens — more on that another time. Her parents, for their part, look forward to getting their punnets of blackberries, some of which are used to make apple and blackberry crumble. This is where I have to draw a line. Blackberries in an apple crumble is, to me, one good thing too many.

The Crumble, Done Properly

The reason for my prejudice in this matter is simple. My wife makes the best apple crumble in the world — Bramley apples, no other variety compares — and its whole genius is in what it leaves out. No oats in the topping, no cinnamon, no blackberries thrown in for colour. It’s the crumble you’d have got at school, the proper kind, not the one someone’s tried to improve. And I think it’s perfect precisely because she hasn’t tried to improve it. Cinnamon is a fine thing. Blackberry crumble is a fine thing. A fancy oaty topping is a fine thing too. They’re just not better. Here, simple wins.

We serve it with Ambrosia custard. Out of a carton. We could make our own, and I’m sure it would be very nice, but the off-the-shelf stuff does the job so completely that there’s no reason to bother. Simple again, and again perfect for it.

The Same Choice, Elsewhere

It has got me thinking about a choice I made about this time last year, when I was weighing up what retiring would actually mean and deciding what my future was going to look like. There was a version of it that involved carrying on, earning more, filling life with the costly luxuries that a longer career would have afforded. And there was the simpler version: more time with my wife, with family and friends, actually being around rather than passing through, sleeping properly, living a bit more healthily than a career of shift work and time zones ever allowed.

Put like that, the simple version sounds almost too plain to be a real decision. Bramley apples but no cinnamon and a plain crumble. Custard from a carton. But the other version was never paid for in money alone. The expensive luxuries cost time away from home, nights that don’t end when you’d like them to, a sleep pattern that never quite settles into anything you’d call regular, before the monetary price even comes into the equation. That’s the real price of it, and it isn’t often fully accounted for. The simple version just charges you honestly.

I have a friend who loves flying light aircraft. Every time I think he’s bought the aeroplane he’s always wanted, another one catches his eye. He could retire tomorrow. Instead, he’s happily working towards the next dream, fully aware of the trade-off: more time working, less time retired. That’s his version of a life well chosen. Mine was different, and it fitted the life I wanted.

Ambrosia was the food of the gods in Greek mythology. Someone at the factory clearly understood the value of simple pleasures. It’s the perfect match for a life that chooses Bramley apples, proper crumble, and more time at home. Life can always do with more custard — and the annual argument about what to call the blackberries.