Teaserberries

I have picked my fair share of berries this season already, some might say.  Others would know it has just been the beginning.  I picked strawberries as they ripened in the yard, tart cherries, sweet cherries, red currants, black currants and gooseberries from the orchard, and tonight, I picked a nice mess of teaserberries.  I even have the scratches and "war wounds" from the canes to prove it.

These are, perhaps, my favorite berries of the whole summer.  Their season is short, opportunity is slim, and there are only a handful available when they ripen.  On top of that, they are most often hidden in the centers and at the bottoms of their thorny canes, making them a dangerous challenge to get to.  Are they worth it?  Good grief, YES! They are so sweet and delicious.  This season, they are even more plump and rosey than normal.  My hope is that the rest of the berries this season are as nice.

Now to decide what to do with them.  I could make teaserberry jam or jelly, but I think I have plenty of those made and in the works.  Teaserberry cobbler might be good, but I am not sure I have enough....  I suppose I will just pop them in the fridge and take them to work tomorrow to eat fresh and share with my coworkers.  I wonder if any of them has ever taken the time to pick teaserberries themselves.  I bet some of them have, they just call them by another name, the first raspberries of the season!  :-)

These are the early berries that ripen on the youngest canes.  The regular crop on mature canes will be ready in a month or so....  Until then, I will hunt and risk injury in search of the few, sweet, ripe teaserberries that lurk about beneath the already towering canes.