Blueberries

When I was small, my Welsh grandmother used to make tarts with a fruit called a bilberry – little berries that grew wild, with purple flesh that yielded dark, deep-red juice.

The blueberry is, apparently, its cousin, and grows wild in North America and Canada, but these are dark indigo-blue outside and inside the flesh is green. The cultivated blueberries we buy here are larger, plump and juicy and very handsome to look at, and they are best and cheapest in the summer. In America, blueberries are served with buttermilk pancakes for breakfast, in pies and in blueberry muffins. I used them in the recipe for Fromage Frais Creams with Red Fruit Compote (see recipe below) – a lovely summery combination.