Hello!

This week I bought two punnets of Mulberries.  My littlest one and I were doing a quick fruit and vegetable ‘top up’ shop and we discovered that mulberries were on special.

It’s amazing how many memories came flooding back as I explained to her the fun I used to have collecting mulberries.  She thought they looked like big, purple caterpillars!

Certain foods, like a scent or a faded photo taken by Dad and lovingly pasted into the family photo album by Mum, immediately bring back memories for me.

Stringy mangoes remind me of the Summer afternoons in Central Queensland on the lawn of our closest friends while Bowen Mangoes remind me of my Grandmother arriving from Far North Queensland with a box full picked by my Great Uncles.

Baby watermelons remind me of my Grandfather and his backyard market garden – rows and rows of every vegetable under the sun. By far our favourites were the watermelons no bigger than a soccer ball.  With the cane knife he reserved for cutting down huge stands of bananas, he would let my brother and I pick a watermelon from the vine and he’d then chop each melon in two with one big swish of his knife. You can imagine we’d then sit on the lawn under the banana trees with juice from head to toe!

Mulberries bring back memories of our best friends who lived four hour’s drive due West of us.  Not a wave in sight so holidays with them consisted of hours in the ‘above ground pool’, riding our bikes to the milkbar at the front of the Chemist shop and munching mulberries until we were purple from top to bottom (literally)!

One year both our mums despaired at our permanent state of purple so had a brainwave.  The worst by far were our feet – because we’d all march around the base of the tree looking for silkworms, collecting leaves and figuring out how to climb to get the fat, juicy mulberries from the higher branches.

So being the mother of invention, our mums invented mulberry socks! Each child was given 2 bread packets and 2 rubber bands.  One bread bag onto each foot, up to our knees and then held in place by a rubber band.  Easy, free and very effective.

So ten minutes and memories later, we popped our mulberries into our trolley and headed off.

The mulberries have been a hit this week:

  • This morning we had Bircher Muesli, a sprinkle of chopped walnuts, a scoop of vanilla yoghurt and mulberries
  • Sunday night we made a Pear, Mulberry, Strawberry and Blueberry Crumble (here’s a recipe for Mulberry Crumble Cake that sounds divine!)
  • And tomorrow (with 4 extras for a holiday play date) the kids have already ordered a “Vampire’s Blood Frappe” (mulberries, strawberries, pineapple juice and loads of ice)
Do you have a history with mulberries?  Does food bring back memories for you?  Or is it just me that has a bit of an obsession with food?!
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  • I remember my grandpa being out picking mulberries from his tree and then all of us kids eating them. They sure do bring back happy memories for me

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  • Had a huge mulberry tree next to us – the kids loved climbing in it [with permission] and bringing back the fruits of their labours.

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  • Mulberries l did have growing up,loved them!

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  • Mulberries bring back memories of my children picking them from the tree next door. The elderly lady living there couldn’t pick them herself anymore, so she made a deal with my children that if they brought in a punnet of mulberries for her, they could eat as much as they wanted and bring a couple of punnets to me. Needless to say my children were purple for weeks till the big old tree stopped producing. But the mulberries were magnificent.

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  • we had a tree when i was growing up. i got so excited when they were at the red stage because i knew that it wouldn’t be long before they turned purple!

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  • Im 23 and only just discovered mulberries! In love ♡♡

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  • Oh do I have fond childhood memories of mulberries! Our local park had a huge mulberry tree that my friends & I would climb real high & sit in it & gorge ourselves full of mulberries! My Mum was never impressed as my clothing was always stained with mulberry juice!

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  • Oh the memories I have of these, seems they are so hard to find these days.

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  • Lucky you

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  • Mulberries are definitely the fruit of my childhood; knowing which back lanes to cut through to get to the laden trees hanging over the fence, feeding the chooks at my aunty’s place & getting roused on because it turned their eggs mauve, painting my little brother’s face just before church :D

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  • My parents planted a white mulberry tree a few years back. While for my mum it brings back memories of her childhood, collecting mulberry leaves to feed the silkworms from which her mother made silk, it stimulates so much conversation about the old ways and teaches my kids about life in another place and another time. At the same time, its making memories for my children of spending time with their grandparents.

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  • Mulberries are delicious.

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  • I have fond memories of eating mulberries.

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  • My cousins had silkworms, can’t remember the taste of mulberries though

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  • My all-time favourite jam would have to Mulberry and Pineapple, because my Nanna used to make it every year with the fruit from a huge mulberry tree that she had. I treasure memories of different foods & special times in my life.

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  • I remember having a mulberry tree in our back yard.

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  • Unfortunately I have never ever tried Mulberries and have not ever seen them before. I will have to look out for them when shopping.

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  • Thanks for the trip down memory lane Nikki. Feeding silkworms the leaves was magic, picking the mulberries, then stewing them and eating a huge plate full still hot with ice cream …Oh so yumm. Oh the good old days.

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  • Oh the good old mulberry tree I remember when I was a kid I would sneak bunches of mulberrys from the neighbours tree and would always get caught because I would have mulberry stains all over me oh good memories

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  • I have never tried a mulberry, I guess it must be time. Thanks for this, I enjoyed reading it.

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