I’ve been holding onto this recipe for a little while - we’ve had quite a warm summer here in the south-east of the UK so it didn’t quite feel appropriate to post such a hearty and warm dish while all I wanted to eat was salad and ice cream...

Autumn is well and truly here in the Northern Hemisphere - it’s dark by 4.30pm, work Christmas dinners are in the planning stages and the leaves are very much in the process of falling off the trees and making a crunchy carpet on the floor…

Legend has it that when St. Michael the archangel kicked Lucifer out of heaven, he landed on a blackberry bush and, ahem, weed all over it. This piece of folklore states therefore that blackberries should not be eaten past Michaelmas (29th September) for this very reason, but I see it as all a better excuse to embrace blackberry season while it’s still here…