Blackberry Patch

Sorry it's been so long y'all! We've had some birthdays, our 1st anniversary (!), lots of travel and working hard. I've got a backlog of posts to get out, but I just had to get this one out right away. It's summer and that means blackberries! I was thrilled to pieces last year when I found a wild blackberry patch at the back of our property. So this morning the dogs and I took a hike through woods and picked berries and wildflowers. The dogs LOVE to go berry picking with me! All of them dive right into brambles and pluck the low hanging fruit.

Now don't get me wrong, I love an plain old-fashioned blackberry pie - crust. However this year I felt like mixing it up. Fresh grated ginger, lemon and a cardamom scented crunch topping takes blackberries to a totally different level. Try it out and let me know what you think!

* Now if you're picking your own berries you practically want them to drop off in your hand. Blackberries don't ripen after being picked and unripened berries are very tart.

Spiced Blackberry Pie
(adapted from http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/blackberry-crumble-pie-recipe/index.html)


Ingredients

1 pie crust (try Martha Stewart's fool-proof Pate Brisee http://www.marthastewart.com/254603/pate-brisee-pie-dough)

filling:
4 cup blackberries
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup flour
2 tsp lemon juice
1/4 tbls fresh minced ginger

topping:
1 cup flour
3/4 cup chopped nuts (walnuts or almonds would be perfect!)
1/4 sugar
1/4 tsp ground cardamon
1/2 cup butter, melted

Directions

1.) Preheat to 350
2.) Place pie dough in 9" pie tin and bake for 10 minutes - let cool.
3.) In a large bowl, very gently mix all filling ingredients.
4.) In another bowl, mix all topping ingredients - stir in butter lastly.
4.) Pour filling into pan with crust, top with crumb topping and bake 30 minutes or until topping is golden brown.

* serve with vanilla or maybe caramel ice cream!