Winter fruits are Here! Juicy, Moist and very More-ish: Blackberry Buns Recipe.

Very simple to make and as pretty as they are tasty, these beautifully coloured Blackberry Buns are the perfect mid-morning snack, lunch box filler or anytime treat.

Now winter is closing in, not that you would notice from the temperature in Manzanillo, right now it is 29º degrees with 66% humidity! Still, winter fruits are starting to make their way to the mercados and they are cheap! There was a lady selling fruit in the street outside Santiago Market so i bought a kilo of blackberries for $25 Pesos, that is around $2 US dollars or just over a pound in English money – a much better deal than buying in the supermarkets. I wanted to make a blackberry cheesecake one day when it was out of season so I checked in the supermarket and for a tiny little box of about 10 blackberries it was $45 pesos! That is around $3.50 USD or £2.20 – extortion! We always try to do our shopping in the markets and local shops out of principal, besides they are the best places to find really good fresh fruit, veg and meat at the best prices plus it’s local produce and the money stays in the community instead of going into the corporations pockets.

These juicy, purple berries remind me so much of England, my sisters and I always used to go blackberry picking in the Autumn and come home with purple stained fingers, faces and clothes! My Mum would make jam with them or apple and blackberry crumble or pie.. mmm, the taste of England in a berry! I couldn’t decide what to make, I knew I definitely wanted to do some jam, which I did and is also very simple, I’ll put it up here at some point, then I couldn’t make my mind up between these buns or an apple and blackberry pie or crumble. The buns won in the end as I was feeling too lazy to fiddle around making pastry and a good choice it was too! I will be getting more blackberries and doing a pie or a crumble soon though. So without further a do, here is the recipe.

Ingredients:

Makes 12

1 1/2 cups of flour
1 1/2 tbsp baking powder
pinch of salt
1 cup sugar
1 cup milk
1 egg
3 1/2 tbsp vegetable oil
1 cup of blackberries, fresh or thawed frozen ones are ok.
margarine to grease muffin/bun tins

Method:

Preheat oven to 375ºF and grease muffin/bun tins

In a mixing bowl sieve the flour and baking powder together, add the salt and sugar, pour in milk, egg and oil and beat either by hand or with an electric mixer until smooth.

Fold in the blackberries gently – I cut them in half first as they were rather big.

Spoon into greased muffin/bun tin, fill them two-thirds full.

Bake for 25 mins or until a toothpick comes out clean

Cool for 10 mins in bun tin on a cooling rack, then transfer buns to cooling rack and allow to cool completely… or at least long enough that you won’t burn your mouth on piping hot berries 😛

Enjoy these scrummy, juicy Blackberry Buns at any time of day with a nice cup of hot tea or coffee, a glass of cold milk or just on their own 🙂

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