The Problem With Blueberries

The problem faced by someone who is both a sensualist and a writer is that is difficult to fully convey the deeply subjective sensual reaction in a universal way. One common method is to assume that everyone for whom you write is familiar with that which you describe. This method lets you take a shortcut. You merely highlight the differences between an assumed standard and that which you are currently describing.

If I say that the blueberries that I picked today are sour, I assume that you know they should be sweet. I could even say that I am implying that they should be sweet since I have chosen to tell you that sour is a departure from the norm. This lets me write tersely and dismiss the subject with a few lines. But it doesn't help someone who has no experience of blueberries, or has only experienced them as chemical or sugar enhanced flavor bombs in processed foods.

This is fine if your thesis is not the blueberries, but the development of some other subject or a plotline. But it does do a disservice to that portion of your audience who wonder what a blueberry is, or, worse yet, think that they are those crunchy sweet things distributed among the flakes of their cereal.

Another common method is to use a synesthetic approach, as oenophiles do, relating the flavor and texture to other things. This is an approach that can easily be abused, leading to meaningless phrases like "they taste like the open sky on a cloudless day;" a pretty sentiment that will mean nothing to someone who lives and breathes in Los Angeles. I see far too much of this sort of folderol and can only hope that overuse of it will lead to the revocation of the writers' poetic license.

I do understand why writers take those approaches. It is hard to put sensation into words in a truly meaningful way. Truth be told, I have used both methods myself. Although they leave me dissatisfied, I have to work with what I have.

Enough of this preface.

There are two general types of blueberry bushes, both bearing the dangerous sounding genus and section of Vaccinium Cyanococcus . The low-bush, as should be explicit in its name, grows low to the ground and bears small berries with intense taste. When I lived in Vermont, I used to gather these blueberries from a series of patches that grew along the fence-line separating the meadows where the cows grazed, from the woodlot. 

Harvesting these small dusty blue globes, about the size of large green peas, required kneeling in the deep grass and wildflowers and sidling on your knees along the row, and because of their small size it took a long time and much wear and tear on the joints to harvest a bucketful. But they were worth the effort.

In my backyard these days, up against the house, there is a large Northern High-bush blueberry (Vaccinium Corymbosum). The flowers are bell-shaped and white with a tinge of green. Each year it bears an extraordinary amount of large, sweet, juicy blueberries, and though I have to battle the birds for my share, there is always plenty.

The high-bush does not require the same type of obeisance. Even the lower branches are easily reachable for an old codger like me. The berries are the same dusty blue color, but they are larger, just a little smaller than a small green grape.

To visualize the size better, a low-bush berry would fit on a dime with room to spare, High bush berries will vary between the size of a nickel and a quarter.

Blueberries grow in clusters, often hiding beneath small canopies of leaves, and each of the berries in the cluster ripens at a different time. They have a flaring "crown" at the end opposite the stem. After the flowers fall away, the small pale green green berries appear. They increase in size then darken to a reddish-purple, then finally ripen to a dark purple almost black, with a dusty outer coating that makes them look blue. Once they start to ripen in mid-July, I can harvest about one and a half to two quarts daily for more than a week.

A ripe blueberry pulls from its stem with just the gentlest of tugs. If there is any resistance, I leave it for the next day or for the catbirds (who aren't so picky about ripeness). If I turn one of these resistant berries over (being careful not to pull it off) it will show dark red perhaps even fading to white at the base of the stem showing that it is not yet ready.

The real trick in harvesting blueberries is the part where you try to transfer them into the bucket. Since I have a heavy beard, duct-taping my mouth shut is not a good option. Having my wife standing near me smacking the back of my head every time my hand moves in the wrong direction helps a bit but futile. The only real solution is to have a very small bucket and a very large crop.

Luckily ... I have both.

This brings us to the hardest part of my description, the sensation of blueberry. It is a difficult task because the environment is such an important factor.

As you may have gathered, I prefer my blueberries as close to their natural state as possible. Syrups, jams, pancakes and muffins are fine, but there is nothing like the berry itself in its unadorned richness.

Hot Blueberries

It is a hot, brilliant day; one that makes me think of the line from Leonard Cohen's song Suzanne, "... and the sun pours down like honey on Our Lady of the Harbor." It is over 90 degrees and even the birds refuse to venture out of the shade of the evergreens. I am in shorts and the thinnest rattiest t-shirt I own, already soaked with sweat from the effort of picking up an empty coffee-can. I'm wearing sandals and the dry grass tickles my bare toes.

I reach up and pluck a blueberry from a high branch and pop it in my mouth. It is even hotter than the air around it since its dark color has been absorbing the rays of the sun for hours.

I roll it around in my mouth savouring the feel of its roundness, the tickle of the crown against my tongue, the slight salt from the sweat of my fingers. Then I position it between my front teeth and bite down. The skin of the berry ruptures flooding my mouth with the juice and pulp.

The explosion of sweetness dominates the initial experience. It is a burst of energy and temporary pleasure against the tastebuds. But as the shock of sugar fades, I sense a slight tartness, a gently touch against the side of my tongue and a sort of astringent quality that you taste in wine. These last two qualities are, for want of a better term, thirst quenching.

But there is another flavor lurking and it starts to dominate. It is a sensation at the back of the tongue, almost in the throat. I open my mouth and breathe in a mouthful of the hot moist air, and now the taste is more defined. There is a roundness to it and a complexity. This is the true flavor and the one that is so difficult to describe without resorting to synesthesia.

It is a blue taste. A taste so perfectly matched to the color of the berry that it nearly makes me believe in a cosmic designer ... nearly. It is as blue as chocolate is brown, with similar qualities of dark richness, but where chocolate seems redolent of earthy warmth, the taste of blueberry is lighter, more evanescent, more aerial.

It tastes of a hot summer day.

Cold Blueberries

It is drizzling and the cold front has brought a fog. Everything is soaked. The ground is soggy, the cuffs of my bluejeans are saturated and swing heavily against my ankles like a bell against its clapper. My shoes and socks are so wet that every time I change my position they squelch.

Every leaf on the bush is dripping. Each berry glistens with a moist mist kiss. A breeze rustles the branches and I get an impromptu shower. A trickle runs down my collar causing a brief shudder.

I reach up and pluck a blueberry. It comes loose freely, but even the slight tension causes another cascade of droplets from the leaves.

I pop it in my mouth and roll it around, enjoying the wetness of the accumulated mist; marveling at its cold smoothness and its rough crown.

I crush it between my front teeth. The cold delays, for an instant, the rush of sweetness and, by the time it comes, the astringency is already in place.

Even slower to emerge is the back of the throat richness of the berry, but soon enough ... there it is, darker and richer for the cold, and slower to dissipate. This time the flavor seems to move, starting in the back and flowing forward, bathing the entire tongue with its depth.

It tastes of a foggy summer day.

I have my poetic license right here officer. When will I get it back?