See and Blueberries are another I just can't get behind. Huckleberry? Yes. I've never had a really amazing blueberry. Back home it was all about Marian berries, and black berries. Strawberries are only great about 3 weeks a year.

Blueberries are best in pancakes. Actually kinda great there. They're good in muffins and okay added in with some cold cereals too. Have had them and raspberries on waffles when strawberries weren't there. But they're not the kind of fruit that will do a lot of heavy lifting.

Blackberries have to be wild ones, kind of sour, small, intense. You make a pie with them. The big watery ones at the store are just for decorations.

Mangoes are OK but kind of taste like bad breath.

When I go to certain Vietnamese restaurants, I like to get a durian milkshake. It’s the king of fruits for a reason. Vietnamese cuisine seems to favor the less funky cultivars, or maybe doesn’t let them get as ripe as is done in some other countries. Good stuff.

There are a couple spots up north where I grew up that are some of thee best for picking wild blueberries. Sandy soil, lots of spruce and pine needle cover. If you can avoid the bears, it's delightful stuff.

kicker_of_elves wrote: Thu Apr 07, 2022 8:26 am If you can avoid the bears

Hang on

kicker_of_elves wrote: Thu Apr 07, 2022 8:26 am There are a couple spots up north where I grew up that are some of thee best for picking wild blueberries. Sandy soil, lots of spruce and pine needle cover. If you can avoid the bears, it's delightful stuff.

As a native Mainer, I'm going to bad here for the wild blueberries. They're small and densely flavorful, mildly tart and have a little earthiness and minerality. Just a completely different, superior thing to the commercial bloobs. Every August I drive up and get a few quarts and starting this season I have a freezer for wintertime hoarding. Great in pancakes and muffins but they really shine in a pie. Just a wonderful fruit.

Wild blackberries are really something special if you can find them. Last year was a bonanza for them within the wilderness of the Columbia River Gorge area. The invasive asian species that overruns everything in the coast and Willamette valley of the PNW can be good but are nowhere near as good as the wild ones.

The best blueberries/bilberries are the high-elevation ones growing in the Olympic peninsula and North Cascades area down to the Indian Heaven Wilderness in Washington. from about 4,500-6,000' up, they are small, intensely aromatic and floral and far better than any huckleberries I've had.

Salmonberries can be okay if you find non-desiccated ripe ones.

Thimbleberries are gritty underwhelming trash. Oregon Grape sucks too, but might be okay for augmenting blackberry jam.

For the best strawberries: pick your own is the way to go. Hood, Albion, Tillamook and Cascade are some of the finest cultivars around here. Most u-picks offer the best blackberries and raspberries too. People here are gaga for Marionberries, but I think the Tayberry is a far better hybrid. I'll buy 2-3 flats when they're in season and make some of the best jam on earth. Obsidian blackberries are quite aromatic and tasty too when they're at peak.

the wild blueberries, y'all speak of, I think is what I was raised to call "huckleberries". and a quick google backs that up. Love those, it's the standard blueberry, I just find it boring.

Based on utilitarianism, bananas and apples are staples in the house. I have one banana a day as part of my complete breakfast (many days it IS my complete breakfast), and a goddamn honeycrisp apple is a perfect snack if I'm peckish.

But based on straight-up flavor, my favorite fruit is pineapple.

PASTA wrote: Thu Apr 07, 2022 4:24 pm the wild blueberries, y'all speak of, I think is what I was raised to call "huckleberries". and a quick google backs that up. Love those, it's the standard blueberry, I just find it boring.

From what I've experienced, the huckleberries are at lower elevations, on taller bushes that grow wider and thinner , and have a more tart, less sugary, and much earthier flavor. Typically these grow like crazy between 1,500'-3,500' or so and will usually stand over 2'-3' tall or more and maybe 2'-3' in diameter and have thinner spread out foliage. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaccinium_membranaceum

Blueberries, or more accurately Bilberries, tend to grow above 5,000' and are shorter, with denser foliage. Most of these are shorter than a 18" in height and smaller than a foot in diameter growing close to the ground in small thickets. These berries are very sweet, floral and aromatic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaccinium_deliciosum

Maybe they're all the same thing and only differ due to the terroir. Either way the alpine ones are magical.