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Japanese Wineberry
Appears in
By Mark Diacono
Published 2010
I can’t quite remember how I came by my Japanese wineberry. I get a little confused by berries I haven’t eaten before - there are so many of them and I tend not to remember which is which until I know their taste. I think a neighbour gave me a Juneberry but maybe it was the wineberry. Regardless, I’m either grateful to her or pleased with the moment of inquisitiveness that got me ordering one.
In truth, some of the lesser-known berries are actually just mediocre crosses thrown onto the market to clean up for a year or two until everyone realises that good old raspberries are so much better. Japanese wineberries are a case apart. A scrambling shrub, it produces large trusses of unbelievably sweet, deep-crimson berries, with an unusual grape-raspberry flavour. Once eaten the berries very much stick in the mind, but by the time mine fruited I’d forgotten whether it was me or someone else I should be thanking.