Berry Good

It must be Father's Day coming up, because the strawberries are in season. We are lucky enough to live in a time and place that we can get fresh strawberries almost all year round, a miracle in and of itself, but the ones we get from California in December have nothing on the ones we get from around here in June.

I went out on Sunday morning to the farm about 20 minutes from our house that grows acres of them, and scored a whole flat for us. That's 8 quarts for 4 people. And this is Tuesday and we're almost done. It's the "all strawberry, all the time" diet for a few weeks here at Chez Loudshoes, and the answer to every question about what we have to eat is "strawberries".

I have some very decided ideas about how to deal with strawberries; they should preferaby be served with something cold and white, like yogurt, ice cream or whipped cream, and strawberries should never be cooked. Cooking a strawberry is just criminal. I won't even make cooked strawberry jam, I'm so offended by cooking a fresh strawberry. In the unusual event that I do make jam, I'll freezer jam, which is much more like mushed up fresh strawberries. I hardly ever make jam, though, because the only way to make jam is to make vats of it, and I end up moving it all over the freezer for a couple of years before I throw it out, and then one day I get it into my head to make jam and I'm right back at it again.

I don't particularly like strawberries and chocolate together, so that doesn't happen very much around here. But strawberries with French Toast, or strawberries with cream cheese on bagels or strawberries on my spinach salad are all okay by me.

The season is short, only about 2 weeks, which is good, because by the end of the season, we've had our fill. Until next year.