Tradition has it that blackberries shouldn’t be picked after September 29th. Apparently when the Devil was kicked out of Heaven on Michaelmas Day he landed in a bramble bush and spat on all the blackberries in a temper. For prosaic reasons, they do tend to be more watery this late in the year, and are more likely to have been infested by rather wriggly visitors so dash out on a quick walk and forage for the last blackberries of the season!
Moist and crumbly, our fabulous flapjack recipe can easily be modified to your own tastes; if you don’t fancy almonds, leave out the ground nuts/essence and make up the weight with an extra 25g of oats. Pumpkin seeds, chunks of date or chopped soft dried apricots all work very well too as well as either ground or chopped hazelnuts. This is one of those recipes that only takes a few minutes to knock up, so I often make a batch when the oven is already on for dinner!
Ingredients (makes 12)
225g rolled oats
125g salted butter
90g golden syrup
90g light brown sugar
25g ground almonds
2 handfuls blackberries (about 150g)
½ tsp almond essence
Method
- Preheat your oven to 180 degrees and line a 20cm square baking tin with greaseproof paper.
- In a large pan, gently melt the butter, syrup and sugar together until all the granules have dissolved, taking care to not let the mixture get too hot.
- Stir in the oats, ground almonds and essence then set aside to cool for a couple of minutes (this ensures that not only is it cold enough to touch, the caramel will soak all the way through the oats).
- Tip just over half the mixture into the prepared tin and, using your fingers or the back of a spoon, press it down so it reaches the corners and makes a flat surface.
- Scatter the blackberries over then push them down gently into the mixture.
- Tip over the remaining oats (you’ll need to wash your hands after squishing the berries!) and press down once again to cover the fruit.
- Bake in the centre of the oven for 18-20 minutes for a softer flapjack, or up to 25 if you like it towards the crispy end of the scale!
