Mine were a complete waste of time this year but by now I would think that the westher is getting too cold to ripen all the flowers not matter where you are!
To favour the existing forming fruit at the expense of new flowers seems a good idea. However if your weather is mild still you could always try surrounding the plant with a poly wall to exclude the cold winds and add some reflective kind of material to speed up the ripening process???
And place the fruit on tiles or bricks to keep them off the damp ground and also to aid ripening .
When you do cut them, cut a bit of the vine off too ... like a T piece ... makes them easy to carry and also to hang up in storage ;)
