Berry leader Driscoll's has pointed out that its successful harvesting of glasshouse blackberries in northern Europe has allowed it to extend the blackberry season to include spring, summer, and autumn, 'without having to compromise on the Driscoll’s promise to always delight consumers with fresh, beautiful and delicious berries'.
A variety called Driscoll’s Victoria is the product of Driscoll’s research and development programme, a blackberry desribed by the company as having a deep purple look, and grown for superior sweet taste, appearance and shelf life.
Driscoll's growing technique uses special assimilation lights and LED, to produce blackberries with an 'exceptional sweet taste, and outstanding fruit size'.
“We began with testing on a small scale, to see how our blackberries performed in covered environments,' explained Lowie Claessens, Driscoll’s applied research manager for northern Europe. 'The trials were a huge success. By growing them in a controlled environment we could adjust and tweak the climate, creating optimal conditions to produce large volumes of sweet and tasty berries.
'Blackberries often have the reputation as being quite sour, but our varieties are always sweet and well balanced - never too tart,' Claessens added. 'Ranging in colour from deep blue to deep purple/black, they are characteristically big and plump and bursting with sweet juice. They really are a game changer for the category.'
