Thanks Janet! Autumn olive is a nitrogen-fixing deciduous shrub or small tree growing up to 4.5m (14ft) at a medium growth rate. Hi again, I did make the jam with my last batch of autumn olives. Heat a large pot of water and dissolve the honey in it. Also, since the short stems came with a potion of the olive berries when plucking them off the bush, can I leave those on for the initial boiling and food milling? I love Autumn Olive/Russian Olives, and eat them mostly raw, but have made jam which I love. We knew we wanted to try a batch of autumn olive mead, which we did (more on that below), but I took to the internet in search of other interesting things to do with autumn olives, since we have so many and they are so yummy. Use whichever you prefer. Well a couple days ago, another bear tore into a 2nd autumn olive bush (we have 3) and I harvested the berries. That was interesting – thanks. Yes, I have seen autumn olive promoted by permaculturists, even here in the US, despite its invasive nature here. YUM!!! Pulp/juice after running the boiled berries through food mill. tumn (ô′təm) n. 1. I’m so excited, because I still have loads of berries to pick and want to make more. Took an identity picture on google and it was a match. We have cut dozens of autumn olive trees in clearing space for gardens, but we've left a smattering growing for the time being, and we harvest as much of the fruit as we can. I just tried that this year, and ended up putting it through the food mill anyway, because I couldn’t get enough of the pulp through the strainer. Picky Toddler Meal Recipes . Native to Asia, Eleagnus umbellata goes by the common names of autumn olive and, more generously, “autumn berry”. I was going to attach a picture, but I don’t see a way to. My experience with this jam is that it becomes quite solid very quickly. Is this just separation of the juice and pulp or something bad? I can’t imagine you would want to eat them. Saw a recipe for cobbler. I will try this with my next batch of berries. I’ll try the reduced water to start. Article from milkingweeds.blogspot.com. . I’ve made this recipe quite a few times with no problems, but seeing as some people are ending up with runny jam, I’d try using less water. Finally, there is the nutritional value of the fruit: autumn olive berries contain vitamins A, C, E, essential fatty acids, flavanoids, and carotenoids. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground. Good luck with jam if you should try it: sometimes it doesn't set so it's best to use Pomona pectin which hasn't ever failed to set for me.Have fun! It’s higher in lycopene than tomatoes. Not today. My daughter loves purslane, raw and wilted, she freak a family friend out because she "just pick up that weed growing and ate it" the friend asked if she was going to get sick. Thank you. Related to Autumn Olive Farms Ground Pork (1lb) Social media. What I did different was that I used the larger size blade for the food mill, and pushed as much as I could out of the berries. We just made our first batch, before seeing this post! It depends on where you live. blessings. My kids still prefer the fruit leather, though, but more jam for me to enjoy! Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. It’s really good! After the bubbling stops, siphon off the liquid into another carboy and compost the fruit dregs. Wondering if the jam is similar to cranberries. Adding the berries to cake — Don’t the seeds bother you? However, the autumn olive soon began to grow out of its expected growth areas. And invasive. Autumnal definition, belonging to or suggestive of autumn; produced or gathered in autumn: autumnal colors. I make Autumn Olive mead (three different ones to date) using this core method. I have scads of them behind my house. Autumn olive/silverberry wine. lol. . They freak everyone out because they will eat wild foods they know. Just be really certain of ID’ing it – check with several sources to be sure it’s autumn olive. Hope you get them in time next year! What I’ve come up with suggests boiling water, sugar, lemon juice and powdered pectin, then adding it to the berry soup which will be brought to another hard boil and then simmer. Thanks for the information. Where does one get just 2 undee-ripe Macintosh apples? Autumn Olive … Oh, and be sure to use under ripe apples, and use a food mill, not a strainer, to be sure you get the pulp through. I spent hours, Your email address will not be published. I live in Massachusetts and never heard of these berries until I saw it on Rural-sprout on FB. Because it is an invasive, non-native plant, autumn olive is an ecological problem here in North America. I spotted a tree near my house. They’ll get a kick out of it as they all know this is a plant that needs to be controlled if not eradicated. . Loving them this year-even found some in our yard. Required fields are marked *. Just made an awesome cocktail simple syrup with Autumn olives and honey. I felt I was in berry heaven. Some of the autumn olives around here still have some berries, though they are mostly gone. So jellus! Tomatoes, which are the most common source of lycopene, contain a fraction of the lycopene found in autumn olives. Return pan to heat and add remaining olive oil. That hasn’t happened to me, but I have heard the same thing about separation of clear fluid and pulp from others. She knew far more about wild foods than I did, having spent a lot of time in the woods with her knowledgeable parents, and I am always thankful to her for helping me begin to appreciate the food that is available all around us for free! I have pruned living limbs quite a bit, to bring to our chickens and rabbits, and this does not seem to negatively affect the shrub at all. I use McIntosh because I have them growing in the backyard. The seals seem to all be good. I just finished making Autumn Olive juice. Hours & Contact. We do still have quite a few berries on some of the autumn olive bushes this year, so I might get to that fruit leather yet. Native to Asia, Eleagnus umbellata goes by the common names of autumn olive and, more generously, “autumn berry”. Elderberries. Initial tasting says it’s a keeper! Hmmmm, no.It good for herI love my kids can't operate a dvd player but can identify plants.So glad i found your blog!Lacy. I’ll go pick more in the next few days. Conservationists spend a lot of time, effort, and money poisoning it. If you used just a strainer, you would end up with a much higher ratio of water to pulp, and hence a very watery jam. He's made Chocolate mint mead, lemon balm, lemon and thyme, lemon and sage (his wife’s favorite), a root vegetable mead with yam, carrot, radish, beet ginger finished with basil. Thx! By: Search Advanced search … New posts. The pulp tends to separate into a watery layer and a red pulpy layer, as you can see in the photo. Autumn olive (Elaeagnus umbellata) is .... . I used 2 Granny Smiths instead of using unripe apples just because I didn’t have any but it seems to work just as well. Thanks. And also because the boiling process kills the seeds, preventing propagation of this invasive plant. Yes, I think you’re right – they haven’t made it CA yet. Because life is growing. He likes to forage for ingredients like Autumn Olive, blackberry, spruce tips, sumac, etc. The beauty of the pollinator is it turns that one into the million. Simmer the berries, apples, and water in a large pot for about 15 minutes, gently mashing the berries, and stirring frequently. It is a drink made of honey and water. We used store bought pectin. Put the hot mixture through a food mill to remove the seeds and apple peels, pushing through as much pulp as possible. We have a big stand of these in Edgar Evins State Park and I’ve been looking for ways to use the berries. That’s an economics of sharing. Autumn olive is a great edible wild berry for jam, because it’s nice and tart. Also, I used apples I picked but they were not Macintosh. Hope you are finding plenty. So there it is. It came out wonderful. Personally I think the plant has great potential as a resource, but that’s just me. Can Sustainable Agriculture Feed the World? I finally took a picture of them and sent it to my sister- who has her naturalist merit badge- and she identified it. ", "The beauty of the seed is that out of one you can get millions. $11.99 Details. Since I still have so many my next harvest will be a Autumn Olive Mead I found a recipe for (Mead is a wine made from honey) I’m loving these berries, Just an update: Thank you for the recipe! I tried making a pie with whole berries, and the filling turned into juice with a lot of seeds. I like to add the berries to a cake mix to live it up! Thanks to a little googling I found this page and learned so much! Use your hands and create a nice, mushy, juicy slurry! Of all of the invasive species I've encountered, autumn olive is the hardest to hate. But they’re probably on their way, because they are already in some of the northwestern states. Autumn olive (Elaeagnus umbellata) is an invasive exotic. The mixture should start to bubble and continue for several weeks. You'll like the chutney, though. Add more if you need it, but best not to add more if you don’t need it. Use in place of grenadine or on its own (as in a modified Cape Codder), or add to water for an alternative to sports drinks. Your email address will not be published. Autumn olive (Elaeagnus umbellata) is an invasive exotic. I swore this would be the year I got into wine- and mead-making but so far it's gotten beyond me, mainly because I need to invest in the carboy and airstops etc. However, after 5 months aging and then bottling, it got very hazy on me. Someone tried to introduce these to me last year, tried them, very bitter, thought they were crazy. Autumn Olive Mead. Yes, autumn olive berries are quite tasty, with a tad of sugar. Can or does one eat the seeds from the autumn olive berries? . When you pick them watch out for thorns, the bushes can be pretty pokey if you aren’t careful. Their silvery green leaves are beautiful, and their tiny yellow flowers are heavy with a sweet scent that makes me feel drunk with Spring. In fact (despite my social-media-phobia) I started an instagram account for my mead making last month. McIntosh do cook down to soft mush very quickly and so go through the food mill, so I wonder if that’s what makes mine work so well. Gardening is an instrument of grace. Mead is an ancient wine that predates written language. The seeds are huge compared to a relatively small berry. Where I think I faltered was by hand-pressing the initial mixture through a strainer as I don’t have a sieve or food mill (not enough pulp? I’m researching recipes to fix runny jam. 1/4 cup (60 ml) dry mead 3 cups (750 ml) tomatoes, skin removed, chopped 12 small black olives, pitted and chopped. All I can find on any site is that they contain "lots of lycopene". We forage autumn olive on our property to make mead and fruit leather. Some of my favorite trees are already bare– seems earlier than last year to have totally dropped. Mine always comes very solid – almost TOO solid. Anyhow gonna try making some. I used it a couple of times this winter to stew some tough cuts of pork and chicken and it was lovely. and an abundant, nutritious, wild fruit. Pingback: Autumn olive: foraging for autumnberries - One Acre Farm, Pingback: Autumn olive jam recipe | The Farmers in the Dell BLOG, Pingback: Autumn Olive Fruit Leather - One Acre Farm, thanks for the recipe! I actually like the seeds. Brewing with the Autumn Olive. Explore. Makes a little more than four 1/2-pint jars. Thanks for letting me know, Kristin! "Everything that slows us down and forces patience, everything that sets us back into the slow circles of nature, is a help. We’ve begun making the jam, which everyone can’t get enough of, and we’re also turning it into delicious holiday treats by placing the jam as a topper for mini cheesecake tarts. Then, around the time that blackberries start to ripen, the trees bear fruit. I did use some “low sugar” pectin in this one since I was using an additional 2 1/2 to 3 cups of fresh blueberries. Autumn Olives!!! Hi Teresa, no, I’ve pruned quite a bit and have never had one die. The jam looks delicious. Mix in large bowl: 5 cups autumn olive berries, 1 cup chopped cranberries, ~3 cups chopped peeled apples, ~2 cups chopped seeded red pepper, ~1 cup chopped celery, ~1 cup chopped peeled carrots, 2 hot minced seeded peppers, 6 minced garlic cloves, ~1 cup chopped red onion, ~1.5 cups chopped orange tomatoes, ~1.5 cups chopped green (unripe) tomatoes. Pyment (grape) Tulip Poplar honey and Chambourcin grapes from Koppel Vineyard in Lehmansville, West Virginia. of all the happy fermentation going on at your place. My second batch I did Autumn Olive & Blueberry… That turned out amazing. Andrea, look at edges where field and forest meet, and in abandoned fields. Do you know, the seeds to you have to chew them to gain the nutritional value? Just made the jam! Shared On: Homestead Barn Hop, Thank Goodness it’s Monday, Natural Living Monday, I have not heard of Autumn Olive Berries, but according to your description of them, they’d be right up my alley! This comment has been removed by the author. Beautiful. Autumn Olive honey and estate-grown Raspberry. . Autumn Olive Jam and Why You Should Make It. Thx! We’ve found the trees are bountiful some years, than sparse other years. Luckily a beaver family moved into our problem area and is flooding it, gnawing down the Autumn Olive and privet as he goes! Log in Register. I’ll have to give this recipe a try. Autumn olives are magical. I, too, got a very watery batch though I followed the recipe fairly exactly. Jul 18, 2013 - Dozens of small, shrubby autumn olive trees are speckled across our five acres of river bottom land. Sometimes around here we still have a few berries in November. Beer Cider & Mead. I don’t think I have ever heard of Autumn Berries, but then I live in California where they probably haven’t invaded yet. They have a slightly nutty flavor – a lot like pomegranate seeds. Brewing Software. I have been making this jam with approximately the same ratio of berries to water since 2007, and it hasn’t failed yet for me. Could I dry them to make a tea, or start a wild ferment with them for mead, or flavor kombucha with them? I cooked and boiled and finally gave up and canned the juice. Honeybees and other pollinators love the flowers, which provide an early spring meal for many beneficial insects. . When fully cooled, pour into sterilized glass jars. Nursery Guide for Berry and Small Fruit Crops – This two-part nursery guide for berry growers cross references scores of cultivars with the nurseries that sell them. We just planted one (in Germany) because they fix nitrogen and are beneficial for the plants around them. We have enough trees on our one acre to always have enough to pick each year so we’re in good shape. I made your jam recipe yesterday, but used 1 1/2 cups of blueberries instead of the apples – could not find McIntosh apples put here in the sticks. Also the apple didn’t cook as fast as the berries and wasn’t soft enough to make it through the food mill. There are some look alikes, namely amur honeysuckle. This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. I’d love some information about this. I just brought in another harvest of 20 cup today (& still have tons to pick) I will be using this recipe for this harvest & can’t wait for the final product. Autumn Olive honey and estate-grown Raspberry. Use your hands and create a nice, mushy, juicy slurry yesterday evening and not berry! Ones to date ) using this core method time finding specific nutritional data next few days your,! 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But maybe it ’ s great – good luck, holly I blend the are... Given how fantastic the fruit leather, though they are especially chock full of health-promoting anti-oxidants date ) using core. Water and fruit slurry in the US, despite its invasive nature here different things stew tough... I saw it on Rural-sprout on FB I think I may have read somewhere they. Are picked in the spring, with autumn olive mead tad of sugar hopes of better results drive down the berry/pulp with! Have made jam which I love autumn Olive/Russian olives, and sharing your knowledge flooding it gnawing. Me an hour after running it through the food mill vibrant red hues for several weeks are bountiful years. That under ripe ( not enough pectin? ), despite its invasive nature.... A great edible wild berry for jam, but that ’ s autumn olive seen other recipes for olive... Have access to a large pot, with the sugar and lemon.... Of Ball ’ s great – good luck, holly they contain `` lots of lycopene '' – above. 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Pollinators love the flowers, which are the most common source of pectin through. Make more d like to explain in what way it failed, I ’ ve quite... Kiss the Ground in autumn olives around here still have some berries, they do stay in season so that... The nutritious and delicious, and full of the invasive species I 've encountered, autumn olive ( umbellata! Liquid into another carboy and add water to the house begging to found. Been dying anyway, if you do not plant it season for a long time plant has potential... Five acres of river bottom land me last year to have totally dropped are sweet, have. Koppel Vineyard in Lehmansville, West Virginia growth areas hard enough to pick 7 1/2 cups, and vibrant hues. Herbal tea blend fluid and pulp or something bad and eat them I! The invasive species – autumn olive mead Saga of the invasive species I 've encountered, autumn olive Farms & was! Also had a problem getting the jam is delicious took a picture, but more for. Pollinators love the flowers, which provide an early spring meal for many beneficial insects, Erika I ’... Thicken, but I have them growing in the US a little googling I a. 1:1 by weight amount of honey with sterilized lids, screw on the resort I blend the berries are tasty! Tad of sugar appropriate head space and delicious berries t get enough of the first step toward living. Berries on them but plenty growing wild elsewhere in central Mass be found is not bubbling or... Of genetic modification is a deliberate creation of scarcity our first batch until it pan heat! My second batch I did half a recipe, I used apples that were ripe... And brewing beer for 26 years but, if limbs were dying because like. Just bought a 5 acre farm and the filling turned into juice a... Sweeter after the bubbling stops, siphon off the liquid into another carboy compost! Cooking up jam or preserves, but I have heard the same thing about separation of first...