Wednesday – opportunity to prepare a morning tea for friends (aka The Custard Club).

A couple of days ago a friend brought me some exquisite mulberries (my favourite berries by far).

Next day I first made mulberry cordial syrup. The strained off berries were still full of flavour, so decided to make a latticed shortcake (crostata), based on the recipe on page 120 of “The Comfort Bake”.

There weren’t going to be quite enough mulberries for the filling, so I added a few raspberries to the mix, along with some lovely organically grown apples (these last a gift from a neighbour) – once peeled and diced, these took on the colour and flavour of the mulberries.

The filling was pretty spectacular in my humble and slightly biased opinion (I really am SO fond of mulberries).

Hope the Custard Club enjoyed the shortcake. A jug of warm custard was sent along as an accompaniment of course!