Early Summer is Mulberry Season

Eating mulberries is one of my favorite summer memories. My brother and I knew where all the mulberry trees were in our neighborhood, and every June we’d make the rounds, collecting the sweet, juicy fruits. I’m not sure what we did with the berries we collected. I do remember putting them on ice cream. Perhaps that’s because most of them ended up in our mouths instead of in the bowl.

I’ve passed on the love of mulberries to our children. While most people “diss” mulberry trees because they don’t like the purple stains from the berries, we actually planted a tree in our yard. Eating the first mulberry is the sign of summer in our house.

We still eat many of the berries straight off the tree, but we also manage to save some for future use. Mulberries freeze easily in little baggies and add a sweet taste and appealing color to fruit smoothies (simply mix nonfat yogurt and fruit in the blender to make a smoothie).

We also love the taste of freezer jam made with mulberries. Freezer jam is easy to make and preserves the freshly-picked flavor much better than canning. Just buy a box of pectin, lots of sugar, and follow the enclosed directions for raspberry freezer jam .

I love mulberries so much that I even wrote a couple of articles about them. You can see them here:

Collecting, Preserving, Using, Planting and Growing Mulberries

Mulberry Recipes for Jam, Syrup, Fruit Smoothie & Whip

What about you? Do you love or disdain mulberries? What are your favorite mulberry memories? Feel free to leave a comment.