My love of Cassis started young...The champagne came later

My childhood smelled like black currants.  My parents immigrated so everything here was new and unfamiliar.  They had no idea what kool-aid is and anything familiar was embraced and carted home to the small apartment we lived in.

Ribena was familiar as black currant products were and are very popular in Scotland.  While my little Canadian  friends had strawberry kool-aid and Tang, I had black currant juice in my lunch box.  You know the little jelly babies candies?  In Scotland the black ones are actually black currant flavour!  YUM!  Guess which little blondie was digging through the bag looking for the black ones?  Guess which little blondie got quite the shock when she bit into a North American black jelly bean?

My in-laws used to have a huge house on a huge property and the gardens included several black currant bushes....my pantry always had a couple of jars of black currant jam waiting for scones and clotted cream to make their appearance.

When my in-laws were moving we took the opportunity to dig up some of the black currant bushes and transfer them to our house - we planted them here and hoped for the best!

2 years later and this is what I found the other day when I checked on them!  We have 3 bushes and they were all full of beautiful, ripe currants!

I found a Siamese conjoined currant!

Relaxing in their bath!

Drying before going into the freezer!

To be made into my own homemade Cassis.

(Which we all know is best when champagne is poured over it!)

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Have a fabulous day!