Strawberry Recipes: 4 Mouthwatering Seasonal Strawberry Treats

Enlarge Image Image Gallery Fresh strawberries are spring’s first dessert. ROGER DOIRON

Article Tools

Image Gallery

Print

E-mail

Comments

RSS

There are few things I anticipate more each year than picking ripe red strawberries from our backyard patch. I enjoy them so much that I considered myself one of their biggest fans, until I met someone who was ready to risk his life for one.

That someone was a chipmunk we’ll call “Barry,” in honor of his favorite dessert. A few Junes ago, Barry was getting more than his fair share of our crop. His raids became so regular and destructive that I decided to put a stop to them by covering our patch with bird netting.

My plan seemed to work. For the next couple of days, we saw no sign of Barry or the half-eaten, discarded fruits that were his calling card. But later that week, I went out to the garden to discover that Barry’s berry love had gotten the better of him. While trying to steal the largest specimen he could haul, Barry had managed to tangle his paw in the netting and was lying there helpless, although temporarily well-provisioned.

It is so rare that I catch a garden thief red-handed (or red-mouthed, in this case) that I couldn’t resist lecturing him. “That’s what you get for trying to eat something bigger than your head,” I told him before putting on thick, leather gloves to free him. If you think chipmunks run fast normally, you should have seen Barry hightail it out of our yard that afternoon.

Thinking back on that experience and what I’ve learned in the meantime, I realize just how much that little chipmunk knew about enjoying berries at their best. The tastiest berry you’ll ever have is the one you eat in your garden on a warm spring or summer day. When they’re sweet and ripe, strawberries don’t need much enhancing. A sprinkle of sugar and a dollop of whipped cream can turn a humble bowlful of berries into a dessert fit for royalty.

The more berries you have, however, the more recipes you’ll want to try. Last year, my family and I grew 35 pounds of strawberries in our ever-expanding patch, not counting the ones that never made it into the kitchen. (Learn more about growing strawberries in Growing Berries That Thrive Where You Live.) We’ve tried several ways of preparing them but find that the best recipes are those, like the salad at left, that leave the healthy, pure taste of the berry intact.

RSS | Comments | E-mail | Print