Long ago, the barberry settled throughout Eurasia and feels great in the thickets of riverine bushes, on dry lands and in the steppes of the Volga, Dnieper and Don, on rocky slopes in the lower belt of mountains in the Crimea, the Caucasus and the Balkans. You can meet an unpretentious tenacious shrub throughout the Eastern Mediterranean. Further east through the Transcaucasus and Northern Iran, then covering all of Asia Minor and Central, the barberry reached Siberia.

There is nothing unusual in the barberry bushes. This is a common ornamental shrub that works great as a hedge in cities and dachas and pleases in early summer with bright yellow flowers, and in autumn with a scattering of berries.

To broaden our horizons, we boldly go to choose a barberry, since there is plenty of it. You can buy barberry in the store (cheaper), or in the market (more expensive). Nobody bothers to also pick and dry it yourself.

So, these types of barberry are represented here.

Left - presented to me avan2ra , on the right, collected by my own hand from my dad at the dacha and dried in the oven. A pleasant surprise - good quality red barberry was also in the shop bag. True, only 5 grams, but it costs 6 rubles. :)
There and there Common barberry (Berberis vulgaris).

The seeds, as we can see, occupy almost the entire "useful volume" of the berry. :)

Purple barberry.

The one on the left - smaller berries, gracefully elongated and with a pronounced bluish bloom - I bought a couple of years ago already in Eliseevsky for good money. The one on the right - the berries are larger and rather rounded, the bloom is not so pronounced - bought yesterday at the market 18g - 50r. As you can see in the photo, these are most likely two different types.
Left Barberry whole-edged, Barberry oblong (Berberis integerrima) from Uzbekistan.
Right - Ball-bearing barberry (Berberis sphaerocarpa), grows a little further north - in South and South-East Kazakhstan.

The bones here are smaller, but there are more of them. :)

What you should pay attention to when buying dry berries in general and barberry in particular.

The berries must be properly dried - the shells break easily when pressed and crushed, but do not crumble into dust.
- Berries must retain their characteristic flavor and aroma. Overdried berries acquire a burnt odor and bitter taste, underdried berries get moldy and deteriorate.
- The berries must be fully ripe, uniform in size and characteristic color. Substandard berries in the photo are marked with numbers 2,3,4,5 - these are unripe, crushed, crushed, overdried berries (black, brown, etc.)
- High-quality berries should not contain small debris - stalks, crumpled berries and small parts, individual seeds, etc., which is indicated by the number 1 in the photo.

As you can see, the quality of all barberry is quite acceptable. By the way, you can see that I did dry out the barberry in the oven. :) Barberry is perfectly stored in paper bags and in glass jars for up to 3 years.

There is also nothing unusual in the fact that the refreshingly sour berries of barberry were added to the case a long time ago. We learned how to cook jams and preserves from it, make drinks and use it as a sour seasoning.

Since I got some fresh along with dried barberry, I decided to make jam from it.
Actually, barberry is a little juicy berry, but barberry jam is something special. True, removing the seeds, you will have to tinker: the berries are poured with water, boiled and rubbed through a sieve. Puree is mixed with the same volume of sugar, brought to a boil and hot jam is poured into sterilized jars. The photo shows that I was too lazy to remove the bones. :)

The main subtlety of using barberry as an acidifier in pilaf stems from its properties. The blue-black berries of Asian barberries are larger, with a thicker skin, and are resistant to heat, but in fact they are already almost black in color, only becoming black-brown in zirvak.
The slender berries of red barberry are more sensitive to prolonged and intense heating - they lose color and are suitable only for folding pilaf, to which they can be added at the evaporation stage, when the temperature is no longer so high, or to decorate the dish before serving.

Have a nice barberry!

Aromatic barberry jam will be your discovery this season if you have never made this delicacy before. Its taste is so bright, emphasized by a slight sourness, that when cooking jam, you don't even need to add citric acid or lemon juice - the berries are already sour. To prepare a dessert, it is recommended not to cook the berries for a long time, but to expose them to three times heating and cooling, due to which the barberry will become transparent and the syrup will acquire a reddish color. The recipe indicates the classic norm of granulated sugar, but it is recommended after the first cooling down to taste the jam and add sugar to your taste if the dessert does not seem sweet to you.

Ingredients

• 300 g barberry berries
• 300 g granulated sugar
• 150 ml hot water

Preparation

1. Carefully pick the barberry berries from the bunches - be careful, as there are sharp thorns on the branches of the bush. Pour the berries into a deep bowl and pour water into it, rinse the berries several times.

2. Pour hot water into a saucepan or cauldron, pour granulated sugar into it and place the container on the stove, bringing its contents to a boil.

3. When the syrup is covered with bubbles, it is ready. Pour the washed barberry berries into it and boil for 10 minutes, stirring from time to time. Then turn off the heating and leave the dessert to cool for about 30-40 minutes. After cooling down, be sure to taste it - you may have to add a little granulated sugar when warming up a second time.

4. Then put the container on the stove again, bring to a boil and boil the jam for about 5 minutes, cool. Place the container on the stove for the last time and boil the jam for 5 minutes, then cool it again. The last time you will see that the delicacy has acquired a maroon color, and the berries themselves have become clearer and softer.

Almost completely preserved in the jam prepared from them. Harvesting this product for the winter does not require much effort. Let's consider the most popular cooking methods.

Thick jam

Berries, the use of which provides for recipes for thick jam, are harvested quite late. The collection takes place at the end of September. It is especially important not to miss the moment when the years are ripe, but not yet soft.

The recipe provides for the use of:

• 2 kg of ripe berries;
• 800 g of water;
• 3.5 kg of granulated sugar.

Important! Jam can be made from whole fruits or pitted barberry. The seeds will not spoil the taste of the treat, but lovers of uniform jam should get rid of them.

The cooking scheme is simple:

1. Rinse the barberry well, remove the seeds if necessary.
2. Divide the sugar into three parts: 2 kg for syrup, 1 kg for pouring, and 500 g will need to be added during direct cooking.
3. Pour into a container and sprinkle with granulated sugar. In this form, the barberry should stand for about a day until it lets out the juice.
4. Drain any liquid that appears.
5. Prepare sugar syrup: pour the separated part of granulated sugar into hot water and boil until the crystals are completely dissolved.
6. Add barberry to the resulting liquid and let it brew for about 4 hours.
7. Cook the jam until it is thick enough.
8. Add the last part of the sugar and boil for another 10 minutes.

Barberry jam for the winter must be poured into a container prepared in advance, closed with metal lids and a blanket must be thrown over it. The useful properties of this dessert are very diverse: jam relieves cold symptoms, improves digestion and has an anti-inflammatory effect.

Barberry jelly

When making jelly from this berry, you do not need to add special thickeners such as gelatin. The barberry contains a large amount of natural pectin, which contributes to the production of a jelly-like mass, subject to certain rules for making a delicious treat.

The following ingredients are used in the cooking process:

• 1 kg of sugar;
• 1 kg of fruit.

Difficulties with obtaining this product usually do not arise, it is quite simple to prepare it:

1. After washing, the berries are boiled until soft.
2. The barberry is grinded to the state of gruel, while the bones are removed.
3. The resulting mass is covered with sugar and put on the oven. During the cooking process, it is necessary to constantly stir the mixture of sugar and barberry.
4. The jelly is brought to a boil, the foam is removed from the brew.
5. It is worth setting aside the container with jam as soon as it thickens.

In a hot state, the resulting mass is laid out in half-liter jars, corked and put in hot water in this form. You need to pasteurize the jam for about 10 minutes.

A classic recipe for the winter

The most popular jam recipe can be made with or without seeds and uses only three ingredients:

• 2 kg of barberry;
• 2 kg of granulated sugar;
• 0.5 l of water.

The step-by-step cooking process is as follows:

1. The berries are carefully sorted out, washed and folded back to dry in a colander or sieve.
2. While excess liquid is draining from the barberry, the water is brought to a boil and granulated sugar is poured into it. The result should be a fairly thick syrup.
3. Barberry is poured into the boiling liquid, the mass is brought to a boil.
4. Leave the jam to infuse. It is best to prepare the jam late in the evening so that it has time to infuse overnight.
5. Sutra jam is boiled again, you need to turn off the stove at the moment when the mixture reaches the desired consistency.

After the lids are rolled up, the jam is usually sterilized. To do this, it is dipped right in jars into a basin filled with water and cooked over low heat. Jam prepared in this way for the winter is stored for a very long time, especially if you put it in a cool, dark place.

Recipes without cooking are very popular: it is very simple to prepare this dessert, and the absence of heat treatment guarantees the preservation of nutrients in full. In winter, the body of a person who regularly uses barberry jam will receive all the vitamins and minerals it needs. The taste of a fragrant and sweet dessert will especially appeal to children: little sweet tooth will be delighted with the proposed delicacy.

All cooking recipes start with the selection of ingredients:

• 1 kg of barberry berries;
• 3 kg of sugar.

How to make barberry jam? The whole process looks like this:

1. Chop one kilogram of berries. The easiest way to do this is with a meat grinder or blender.
2. Sugar is added to the resulting mass, mixed well.
3. The mixture is distributed in pre-prepared glass containers and closed with lids.

The product should be stored in the refrigerator. This will allow you to enjoy a delicious dessert at any time: just open the door and take out the coveted jar.

At home, you can make a delicious treat of barberry jam with honey. True, it cannot be called jam, so it can be cooked without boiling. Add barberry berries to liquid fresh honey (preferably with acacia or floral) and put them in half-liter jars. Store in the refrigerator and consume 1 tbsp. l. in a day.

Vanilla recipe

When making barberry jam, you can use various additives. For example, apples or lemon will help to diversify the taste. And to get an appetizing smell, the hostesses are advised to add vanilla to the jam, which gives the aroma of delicacies unique sweetish notes.

Making such a jam is not difficult:

1. 5 cups of berries are poured into a saucepan, washed thoroughly, and pitted.
2. Syrup is brewed: for this you need to mix 4 glasses and 8 glasses of sugar.
3. The prepared fruits are poured into a sugar liquid and set to infuse.
4. A day later, the jam is put on the stove and boiled. Then the container is again set aside and kept for 24 hours in a cool place.
5. Boil the mixture again and add the vanilla. The jam is ready, it remains to roll it up in a glass container.

Apples recipe

Apples will complement the delicacy with useful vitamins. It is better to give preference to sweet and sour fruits, which will emphasize the sophistication of the dessert to a greater extent.

For barberry jam you will need:

• 0.5 kilograms of apples;
• 0.5 kilograms of barberry;
• 350 grams of sugar;
• 1-1.5 cups of water.

Wash the fruits thoroughly, peel the berries, cut the apples into thin slices, remove the seeds. We put all the ingredients in a saucepan, which must be put on a small fire. Boil until a drop of jam, laid out on a plate, holds its shape. Arrange the finished dessert in sterile jars, wrap it in a blanket and leave to cool completely.

Live jam looks much more appetizing than in the photo. You can see for yourself by making an excellent dessert at home. But when using it, it is worth taking precautions: barberry, like any product, has contraindications. These primarily include cirrhosis of the liver, gastritis, gallstones, and pregnancy.

Barberry is a unique plant that is famous not only for its aroma, but also for its beneficial properties.

Barberry berries are a storehouse of vitamin C, ascorbic, malic and citric acids. Therefore, consuming barberry-based foods will help relieve fever and stop bleeding.

If you have a disease of the liver, bladder, kidneys, then in no case neglect such an important berry for you.

Barberry is widely used in the culinary business. Jams, jams, syrups, as well as various sauces for meat dishes are prepared from its fruits.

For evening tea, you can independently prepare aromatic tea from the fruits of barberry, which will not only saturate you with vitamins and nutrients, but will also have a preventive effect against various diseases. Moreover, you do not need a lot of time and effort. Just pour boiling water over the fruits and let it brew for half an hour. Tea is ready.

And to drink it tastier, let's make barberry jam. In terms of its taste, it surpasses even feijoa jam.

Barberry jam - recipe

To make jam you will need:

one kilogram of barberry berries,

one kilogram of sugar

six glasses of water.

First, wash and clean the kernels of the barberry. Cover with cold water and let sit for six hours.

While the berries are soaking, prepare the syrup with the specified amount of sugar and water.

After six hours, pour the prepared syrup over the barberry berries and cook over low heat until they become soft.

There is another way to make jam. To do this, put the berries in a jar and pour over the boiled cooled syrup. Insist during the day.

For the next, drain the syrup and boil it. After cooling, pour it back into the jar of barberry and leave for another day.

On the third day, drain the syrup and place the berries in a bowl. Put it on low heat and cook until the barberry is fully cooked.

The most fragrant and very healthy barberry jam is ready. It has a pleasant sweet and sour taste and is not sugary at all.

What better way to brighten up cold winter evenings than a cup of tea with delicious jam?

Spoil your loved ones with cherry jam! Cooking this sweet piece will not take much of your time. But how much joy this dessert will bring both adults and children.

In addition to its unique taste, this jam is also very healthy. The main thing is not to get carried away.

Cherry jam: homemade recipe

You will need:

a kilogram of ripe cherries,

a kilogram of sugar

one and a half glasses of water,

a glass of walnuts,

a quarter teaspoon of vanilla.

Wash the cherries thoroughly and remove the seeds. If possible, refuse to use special tools designed to remove seeds, otherwise the berries will lose their attractive appearance.

Cut the walnuts with a knife into small pieces no larger than a cherry pit.

Stuff the berries with prepared chopped nuts and set aside.

Now you can start preparing the sugar syrup. To do this, pour sugar with water and put on fire. With constant stirring, bring mixture to a boil and remove from heat. Then pour over the cherries so that the resulting syrup completely covers them.

Let the fruit steep in the syrup for about three hours, then simmer until the berries are transparent. Make sure that the syrup does not boil, otherwise the cherries will not remain intact.

A few minutes before the end of the cooking process, add lemon juice to the cherry jam. If you want the finished fruit to have a subtle sweetish flavor, add a little vanilla five minutes before removing from heat.

Cooked jam must be poured into previously prepared sterilized jars and sealed securely.

The berries taste especially bright two months after boiling, so it is especially important to let the jam brew well. In late autumn - early winter, you can fully appreciate the taste of this delicate berry preparation.

Hey! I'm quite quick with a simple barberry jam recipe. I shot a new book in the summer, and it will contain a lot of recipes for blanks. Now is the time for barberry, it is ripe and is about to start ecs)