Barnstorming on an Invisible Segway

Mmm, gooseberries. I have not yet seen a gooseberry in the US, never mind in California; do I have to grow my own?

But you wanted a trio, so these: gooseberry fool, as a way to end a dinner; gooseberry tart, for a more serious dessert (and it should be tart, in the same way that sour cherries make the best pie); and gooseberry sauce with mackerel, where the sharpness of the fruit cuts through the richness of the fish.

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Gooseberries

I love gooseberries. Things to do:

Just eat them! But they need to be ripe, meaning the berries are usually a nice dark red, not the unripe green which I think was my first introduction to them. They're still tart when ripe, but much sweeter. They remind me quite a bit of kiwis in taste, texture, and sour/sweet ratio, but more flavorful.

Gooseberry pie! Standard Joy of Cooking berry pie recipe, with maybe a bit of extra sugar, and lots of extra sugar if you're using green gooseberries. (But why would you do that?) Haven't actually done this one myself, I'm afraid -- I'd intended to, and then saw that ripe gooseberries were going for $6/half-pint at my local farmers' market, and decided that $36 for one pie was more than I could stomach, no pun intended. But it's really very hard to go wrong with a berry pie. Maybe next year. Gooseberry jam, same deal.

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I saw them for the first time since I was small, this year at my local farmers market in Boston. I hope they're back next year.

I know they'll grow in California, because when I was hiking the John Muir Trail we found them growing wild all through the area the Rainbow Falls fire had burned over, and I snacked on them as we walked. I'm afraid this doesn't help you find them grown, though, especially the cultivated varieties which aren't covered in prickles.

Ohhh, gooseberry sauce with mackerel is something I had never considered. It sounds heavenly. I bet it works with sour cherries or lingonberries too...

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Just eat them! But they need to be ripe, meaning the berries are usually a nice dark red, not the unripe green which I think was my first introduction to them.

In the UK, it's more than a first introduction: it is considered the natural state of the berry. I was a mature adult before I even understood there was anywhere else for them to go; the first dark red ones I met, I was convinced I was being misinformed. How could these be gooseberries? Wrong colour, and sweet! - clearly a different fruit altogether. And that was from a friend's garden; I don't think I've ever seen ripe ones in a market. We buy them green and cook them green and that's that, essentially. Very, um, British...

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They do grow here--Stella gets them sometimes and makes jam--but they are rare, and growing them yourself is the most straightforward way of getting them in non-jam form. Even in jam form, not common--but I can find cloudberry preserves, and fresh cloudberries, it is to laugh. So.

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LINGONBERRY MACKEREL YES DO WANT.

Did you know that's where my name comes from? True story. (Er, the lingonberries. Not the mackerel.)

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jenett

Two years ago, one of my co-workers brought me half a 5 gallon bucket of elderberries. They're a pain to process, but yummy.

Things I did with them:

1) Made tincture (there are a bunch of recipes for this, but I am having trouble tracking down the one I used right now. Basically, pour elderberries in glass jar, cover with alcohol, cap - I did vodka, and now I want to try gin - turning the jar over a couple of times a day for 6 weeks. At the end, strain, pour back into bottle. You can then add sugar or honey to taste. You can also add lemon or orange peel, or spices.

http://www.loveandwildhoney.com/archives/455 has instructions and suitable "You might want to avoid if" warnings.

It is not bad as a mixed drink thing (I do some with fizzy water, periodically) but what it's really excellent for (if you can have alcohol) is a tablespoon or so every hour or two when you feel a cold coming on, and then 3 times a day after the first few times. It's been reducing symptoms dramatically for me.

(I understand the strained berries soaked in vodka go really nicely over ice cream, too.)

2) I also made elderberry syrup: boil the berries until they make juice, strain, add equal part sugar to make a syrup while you boil the liquid, be very careful not to burn yourself with hot sugary stuff. Bottle. You can take it like the tincture at the first sign of colds, and it is also yummy in fizzy water.

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I know, right? And so tantalizingly possible, unlike gooseberries at this late date... I've been thinking about an Ikea trip anyway.

re: names, I would be surprised if it were the mackerel. :-)

I always wonder how names sound in their native tongue. As transparent as Berry (Halle Berry) or Farmer (Fannie Farmer) sound to us, I suppose.

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Interesting. I associate gooseberries, even green, strongly with German- or Scandinavian-American cooking; it would not have occurred to me to think of them in the context of British food. ("Aren't they too strongly-flavored?")

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Heh. This is the world of total misconception: I point here, as I have pointed elsewhere, to the traditional British love of mustard and pickles and other strong flavours. And gooseberries. You don't see them so much these days, but in my childhood they were a common element in the diet. Tho' not so much with mackerel; as far as I'm aware, that comes from the foodie revolution of the '80s and '90s.

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Also, of course, elderberry wine. And elderflower wine, come to that.

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Oh, and I'm sure I've eaten grouse with an elderberry sauce. Also elderberry/apple pancakes. And there must be more foodwise one could do...

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arkessian.livejournal.com

You mean I might like them if I ate them right/ripe? I loath them in their loathsome green sour state...

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shewhomust.livejournal.com

I think red gooseberries are a different variety; I've had ripe green ones, though maybe a more yellow-green.

Also, upside down cake.

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shewhomust.livejournal.com

I find elderberries on their own too strong and pippy (is that a word?). But add a handful of elderberries when you're cooking apples (or pears), for pie or crumble or just stewed...

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Although! One of the potential etymologies of Marissa is "of the sea." So "Marissa Lingen" could mean lingonberry mackerel. Sort of. More likely lingonberry mermaid. Um.

(The likelier etymology is "bittersweet." Which mackerel generally is not.)

In Minnesota, Lingen/Lingon is in the native tongue. I can say "like the fruit but with an e" and get it spelled right 90% of the time. I tried that once in California and got a slip of paper handed to me: "Lemen." Oops, no.

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Cheddar cheese: it doesn't come out of nowhere.

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porphyrin has said that she puts up some of the green ones just for my Scando mother and me, letting them ripen all the way for everyone else. We are grateful.

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By the longest pair of stockings I own, I swear that pippy is a word.

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Elderflower cordial--and with it elderflower wine/liqueur--is one of the tastes that got preserved in amber for me: I had some when we were visiting Scandinavia for my 10th birthday and then not again until twenty years later. So the associations never got spread out as they would with something like strawberries or dilled cucumbers.

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magentamn.livejournal.com

I have a gooseberry bush and a red currant bush. Friends have made gooseberry pie and pronounced it good. I don't know if one could take a cutting and root it from either bush, but I'd welcome the attempt. I'd be willing to negotiate either being transplanted so I could put in more raspberries.

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Mpls area friends, take note! I am no gardener, so

magentamn would be sending these lovely plants to their doom, but if someone else can negotiate with her for them, it sounds like it'd be all for the best for everyone.

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