Autumn Raspberries

In the beginning of June we started picking our first strawberries; these were the first fruit from our newly planted soft fruit beds. At that time we had hoped we would pick a few raspberries this autumn but weren't sure if we would get any crop at all.

We planted two types of raspberries; those which fruit on the new season’s wood (primocane or autumn fruiting varieties) and those which fruit on the previous season’s wood, so don't fruit till the second year after planting. We planted two varieties of the autumn fruiting type; Autumn Bliss and Galante, 10 canes of each.


The autumn fruiting varieties have been doing really well, obviously appreciating all the organic material we dug in the beds last autumn (before planting the canes) as well as the subsequent spring mulches of compost. Autumn fruiting raspberries are also said to be more tolerant to drier summers and may be this is why this type of raspberry seems to be doing particularly well with us.

Much to my pleasant surprise we have now been picking almost 1 kilo of raspberries every 3 days since the middle of August, that's over 12 kg of raspberries to date from 20 newly planted canes! Whats more they taste lovely and with the help of our 6 cats we have had no major problems with birds eating the fruit.

Raspberry and hazelnut roulade

All this has meant that Joe has been busy in the kitchen preparing lots of lovely raspberry desserts and our guests have been able to enjoy the delights of freshly picked organic raspberries as well as a selection of raspberry deserts.

Raspberry and almond torte

Or just raspberries with cream.