Berry Delicious, Denmark WA

Summer time is berry time, but nothing compares to the deep flavours and zesty vitamin C tang of fully ripe fresh berries that you've picked in the cool of the early morning. And that is just what we experience when visiting Bramble Farm in Denmark, on the southwest coast of Western Australia.

We come across Bramble Farm by accident while driving along the Scotsdale Tourist Drive (a scenic route that leads west from Denmark) in search of Denmark Farmhouse Cheese. Along the way, a gravel side road lined with beautiful white barked eucalyptus beckons us to take a spontaneous detour. And there, about 300 metres along the road and up a hill, we spot the sign for a berry farm and drive in, not knowing what to expect.

After parking under a shady tree beside a bevy of reclining bovines, we proceed toward the farm shed to find out what's available.

There are four or five other people already picking berries, but before we are let loose to do our own picking, the farm owner gives us a quick tour through the trellised brambles. He points out the different varieties (raspberries, silvan blackberries, youngberries, boysenberries and loganberries) and shows us how to tell whether or not they are ripe. He also demonstrates the different picking techniques: blackberries are gently twisted - if ripe they pull away easily; raspberries are gently pulled so that berry pulls clear of its internal white pith.

We pick to our hearts content - pick and sample - and the punnet pictured above costs just $12 – a bargain compared to the prices of supermarket berries that are many days away from being freshly picked.

Bramble Berry Farm also sells homemade berry ice cream as well as several different types of farm produced berry jam. We sample the ice cream (delicious!) and buy a loganberry and a boysenberry jam, both of which are quite sensational.

DENMARK BRAMBLE BERRY FARM, Lot 8 Lantzke Road, off Scotsdale Tourist Drive, Denmark 6333, Western Australia, is certainly worth a detour. However best to contact them beforehand on (618) 9848 1436 to see what berries are available. They are open daily during school holidays; otherwise on weekends.