blackcurrants

[qahtan]

Have just picked  9 1/2 lb blackcurrants, the fruits tend to be larger this year. now have to juice them and make jelly.
Canadians I find don't seem to know much about blackcurrants.. hmmmm
              qahtan

[qahtan]

[Flighty]

Qahtan do you have the fiddly job of taking the stalks and flower ends off them first, and if so is there an easy way to do it?
It's something that I remember always doing for my mum as she had arthritic finger joints and couldn't do it.

[grannyjanny]

Is it best to take the branch out with fruits on or to just pick the fruit please.

[pigeonseed]

Oh I've just been picking individual ones which are ripe, a handful or two some evenings.

Do people usually pick the whole lot at once?

[grannyjanny]

PSeed our fruit is dangling down in clusters. Ben Salek, very juicy.

[pigeonseed]

Yes ours is too (well most of it's eaten now!   ;D) it is Ben Conan, I think. But it was always some which were soft and ripe and some a bit behind, so I just picked all the ripe ones.

Is it possible to leave them hanging, waiting for the others to join them in ripeness?

[jennym]

It seems to me that some varieties of blackcurrant are better at ripening more evenly, or maybe it's just where I have them located - Ben Gairn seems better than the others for me. It is easier to pick them all at once (but you need patience and netting while they all ripen) but I admit I can't help messing about to get the first few ripe ones that come  ;D.
I find one way of getting most of the stalks and flower ends off is to put the berries into an over the sink sieve drainer (like a very large coarse sieve) and rattle them about a bit. The bits stick in the sieve. The riper they are, the less well-attached the stalks are too.

[qahtan]

we just remove the stem end, give them a good wash in hot water then juice them in Mehu Miisa. (steam juicer)  and got enough straight juice to make 10 pound jelly. plus enough for a little taster on a scone.
probably could have got a little more juice but we had had enough of it by then. they did  seem more irony.

Although we don't grow goose berries but did in  UK we used to top and tail them fiddly blooming job.
  qahtan

[pigeonseed]

Of course, I wondered how people make jam and stuff like that - I realise now they expect to pick them all at the same time!

But for the purposes of pleasing the children after dinner - picking a few at a time is ideal I suppose!

[gypsy]

I have still got last years fruit in the freezer. Usually I freeze them and then make jam in the winter (summer is too hot to toil over the cooker). I forgot last winter, so am making fruit pies etc with this years crop. 

[pigeonseed]

Sounds like you must have had a lot, Gypsy! How many bushes have you got?

We've got one. But still I'm happy with what we got, considering it was just one plant, and hasn't been any trouble at all to look after. (Fingers crossed it doesnt get any diseases )

[qahtan]

I was told some years ago that if you do get a mould on some of your blacurrants it's due to cold night....... there does always appear to be a few currants with mould on them, but I just pick them out while going over them before washing.. qahtan

[Old Central]

Is it possible to leave them hanging, waiting for the others to join them in ripeness?

Pigeonseed,

I suspect that many of our modern varieties, Ben whatever, have been bred to become ripe at the same time for commercial picking reasons. I found an old bush on my plot that seems to ripen bit by bit over the season so is probably more suited for your requirements. In comparison my red currants I picked from my bushes from June to October last year whilst my blackcurrants dried out by mid/late August if left for too long.

OC

[gypsy]

They are so easy to propagate, from cuttings when pruning. I started with one, then took cuttings and ended up with loads! I moved them last year, so a lot less fruit this year. I have only kept 6 plants. However I have got one next to the compost heap, it was crammed with fruit. Having a pie again today, yum!