Seasonal Wild Fruits, Berries and Nuts in and around Leeds

[jonleeds]

Majorhoundii, when I was a kid growing up in Morley we used to pick blackberries down Rooms Lane which used to be a quiet country lane with farmer Lindley's farm at the top of the hill overlooking the M621. Also in the vicarage on Rooms Lane the then vicar of St Peters Reverend Hind, Morley's Parish church used to allow my friends and I to pick lovely tasting pears from an enormous pear tree in what was then a very large vicarage garden where they used to hold the church fetes. There was also a rare example of a mulberry tree which was the first time I ever tasted mulberries. We were banned from climbing the mulberry tree though because the limbs were very fragile. There were a few places where we used to go 'scrumping' for apples, usually in the big old ex-mill owners Victorian mansions of which there are quite a few around Morley. I've also picked bilberries in large numbers at Otley Chevin and Brimham Rocks although thats a really fiddly business, I think it was on that River Cottage tv show I saw someone doing it by sweeping a basket through the tops of the bushes but it looked a bit of a hit and miss affair. I'm going to see if I can find any beech nuts this year cos apparently they only come out in certain years, I've never tried them but they're supposed to be tasty, a bit like hazelnuts but smaller.    

[Tyke]

If anyone is interested I have a recipe for Elderberry wine. Its an old fashioned recipe and you have to leave the wine for around 2 years but the finished article is superb.

[leedslily]

We picked a fair few bilberries on the Chevin recently, and I'm keeping an eye on the blackberries in Hawksworth wood - just a few so far. Got sloes and rosehips there last year too - gin and jelly!A couple of years ago we were living temporarily in East Ardsley over the summer and we could have lived on blackberries - there were absolutely loads, and no-one else seemed remotely interested in them.

[raveydavey]

There are a load of blackberries (and a few raspberries) growing by the footpath alongside Cock Beck. Nicely ripening, but apparently ignored by most.

[Jogon]

Nice bit of Watercress on an overflow by 'one of the locks' on Leeds Liverpool Canal.

[stodge.]

[I'm going to see if I can find any beech nuts this year cos apparently they only come out in certain years, I've never tried them but they're supposed to be tasty, a bit like hazelnuts but smaller.    Thats true about the Beech nuts, I think we're in for a good harvest this year. (although the squirrels are at the young nuts already)There's loads down Gledhow Valley Woods. They do taste a bit like Hazel's but very fiddly to get into, they leave your mouth a bit dry.

[Linky Oik]

Loads of blackberries around Temple Newsam woods - particularly up the Bullerthorpe Lane end.I've just a had very tasty blackberry crumble made with berries picked near the Avenue that runs through the woods.

[raveydavey]

Jogon wrote: Nice bit of Watercress on an overflow by 'one of the locks' on Leeds Liverpool Canal. As a kid, I can remember being taken to pick watercress from a stream off Parkside Road at Meanwood by my grandparents. Very tasty it was too. I wonder if it still grows there..?    

[jonleeds]

See the photo above of nearly 3 kg of blackberries I picked in about an hour today, of course I tare'd off the weight of the bowl before weighing them! Still lots of blackberries to be had everywhere, I've made some fabulous blackberry pies. Just picked a lot of apples of some trees overhanging West Park fields, very small like a cox's type English eating apple but nice and sweet and tasty. I've found a group on Yahoo called Leeds Urban Harvest who organise local fruit picking, plus I've noticed quite a few posts on Freegle / Gumtree where folks are offering the contents of their apple trees to any interested parties to take rather than see them go to waste which is nice and I've seen quite a few people of all ages picking blackberries around my area. Seems this is a tradition thats still going strong.    

[Steve Jones]

Jontry Googling a group called Incredible Edible,they have lots of information on foraging around the area.