Comments

  1. says

    Partridge Berry has a long use for all uterine ‘complaints’ and as a soft salve for sore nipples when breastfeeding.

  2. rq says

    Caine
    Didn’t know about the nipples, but cranberries (related?), which I sort of mentally group with them, are good for urinary tract infections, so yay for groin-regional issues. :)
    Either way, good to know that red berries = women’s complaints (though I hear cranberries work for everyone). :D Mostly I enjoy them on toast in jam form and one year I made partridgeberry-orange-thyme jam and it was delicious. They’re also delicious combined with raspberries. Speaking of which, my late harvest raspberries are showing signs of being very very fruitful again this year, so I’ll have to seek out some partridgeberries and do some jarring again this year (skipped last year, heh).

  3. Ice Swimmer says

    Gorgeous pictures.

    The following only holds true if this is Vaccinium vitis-idaea.

    Also known as lingonberry. Puolukka in Finnish. And yeah, can be used much like cranberries. Lingonberry jam (puolukkahillo) is used with liver and blood dishes here (liver casserole, fried liver, blood pancakes, blood sausage). Also good for sweet/sour desserts and the juice goes well as a mixer for vodka.

    I’ve previously said that their leaves turn red for the winter. This is generally not true, the leaves will become red due to a fungus infestation sometimes.

  4. lumipuna says

    At first I thought it was some other, closely related species because a) the plants looked a bit unusual for V. vitis-idaea b) I’d never heard the name partridgebrry before. Wikipedia seems to imply that the traditional English name in Britain is cowberry, whereas modern English usually uses either lingonberry (from Swedish lingon) or various North American vernaculars.

    Either way, good to know that red berries = women’s complaints

    At least you can make menstrual jokes, like in Finnish expression “lingonberry days”

  5. rq says

    Ice Swimmer
    Yes, it’s also lingonberry, but I’m not sure which is the more commonly known English term (obviously I chose wrong :D). And yes, it is an evergreen plant -- though the usually closely growing wild blueberry does turn red and drop leaves in the autumn, so it might be a ‘common knowledge’ mix-up.

    lumipuna

    “lingonberry days”

    That sounds even better when translated into Latvian, though I doubt anyone would understand what I’m talking about. :D

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