The Raspberry Season Has Begun In Clackmannanshire!

Yesterday I had my first wild raspberries of the season.

They were small and not many of them yet, but they tasted wonderful - far better than the ones you usually get in the shops, which I'm sure have been bred to look good and travel and keep well rather than for flavour.

Wild strawberries have also got going, but because they are so low on the ground I always get a mental image of a dog having peed over them when I'm tempted to eat them there and then.

Not that that always stops me.

Like the raspberries, wild strawberries also have more flavour than the ones you get in the supermarkets, but I find they're not so sweet and the taste varies quite a bit. So I often don't find them that exciting to eat.

They are tiny too, and it takes ages of bent-right-over picking to get enough for your tea.

I suppose I should declare a bias that makes me unfit to be a judge in the Strawberries v Raspberries contest.

I once had a summer job on a horticultural research station picking fruit, strawberries included.

There were all sorts of varieties, many full of flavour that you never find in the shops and I, like the other pickers, ate our fill.

Having gorged myself on the ultimate of cultivated strawberries, I've ever since experienced (and have now long been resigned to) disappointment whenever I eat what gets sold these days.

I also wonder if I might unwittingly have been part of the research that led to the feast-for-the-eyes and good-for-distribution but never-mind-the-flavour strawberries that we get now.

Nevertheless, I have no hesitation in giving my vote for Wild Food Of The Season in Clackmannanshire to raspberries.