Rather windy of late, wouldn’t you say? 

Well there's been one good result of that for us humans – the cherries that often sit high in the wild-cherry trees (Prunus avium), until they turn ripe, and are munched by the birds, are now scattered on the ground.

It’s not the best year for them, due to the cold April when they were trying to blossom, but never turn your nose up at an opportunistic forage is what I say (a philosophy that’s got me into trouble for rifling through supermarket skips in the past, but that’s another story).

There’s various recipes out there for jams, pies and tarts, but I’m afraid the small size of the cherries makes for a rather tedious job of pitting, so I avoid that by creating a far more worthy concoction: cherry brandy. Look on line for recipes, but it basically involves brandy, wild cherries, sugar, the occasional good shake (of the bottle not yourself) and a few months of virtuous patience.

It’s no great surprise that the wild cherry is rich in vitamins and anti-oxidants, but the bark has also been used over the centuries for making a potent and soothing cough syrup – something I hope to experiment with in the future.

Foraging considerations: With its creamy white blossom in spring and fiery display in autumn, the wild cherry is a distinctive tree that sprinkles itself around most broadleaved woodlands. It has a dark purple tinge, but more distinctive is the thick horizontal lenticils on the trunk – in older specimens the bark also becomes deeply fissured and starts to peel (offering great tinder, if harvested respectfully).

The cherries look like smaller versions of shop bought ones (Prunus avium is the distant ancestor of many of the modern cultivated varieties) and they usually taste a little tart by themselves –which is why most recipes seem to involve sugar. The stones have been found in prehistoric sites across Europe, so we can only guess at how our ancestors prepared them in the days before imported sugar – perhaps they fermented them to make a wine or combined them with honey for some kind of desert.

Don’t worry if they are not fully ripe when you collect them (chances are they won’t be if they succumbed to the recent winds). Put them on a warm window sill for a few days and all will be well.