Preserve Strawberries: Easy Recipes to Stretch Strawberry Season

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When strawberries come into season in your area, ask the farmers which varieties they’re growing and do a taste test to see which ones you like best.
When strawberries come into season in your area, ask the farmers which varieties they’re growing and do a taste test to see which ones you like best.
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With simple step-by-step instructions and 175 delicious recipes, “Put ’Em Up” will have even the most timid beginners filling their pantries and freezers in no time! Recipes range from the contemporary and daring — Wasabi Beans, Cherry and Black Pepper Preserves, Sweet Pepper Marmalade, Berry Bourbon, Salsa Verde — to the very best versions of tried-and-true favorites, including applesauce and apple butter, dried tomatoes, marinara sauce, bread and butter pickles, classic strawberry jam and much, much more.
With simple step-by-step instructions and 175 delicious recipes, “Put ’Em Up” will have even the most timid beginners filling their pantries and freezers in no time! Recipes range from the contemporary and daring — Wasabi Beans, Cherry and Black Pepper Preserves, Sweet Pepper Marmalade, Berry Bourbon, Salsa Verde — to the very best versions of tried-and-true favorites, including applesauce and apple butter, dried tomatoes, marinara sauce, bread and butter pickles, classic strawberry jam and much, much more.

The following is an excerpt from Put ‘Em Up by Sherri Brooks Vinton (Storey Publishing, 2010). This comprehensive guide to home preserving teaches refrigerating, freezing, drying, canning and pickling techniques, and after mastering these crafts, readers can dig into more than 150 pages of mouthwatering recipes designed to preserve everything from cucumbers and tomatoes to grapes and watermelon.

My kids wait all year for fresh strawberries. When they finally arrive in the farmers market, I’m lucky if I can get a quart home — they woodchip right through them. The strawberries we find in the farmers market are hugely different from those sold in the grocery store. A strawberry is a bright red, smallish fruit with complex flavor but a short shelf life. It’s not meant to be as big as your fist (no matter how appealing such a monster would be to dip in chocolate on Valentine’s Day) or to last for weeks in the fridge.

Until I started hanging out at farmers markets, I didn’t realize there were so many varieties of strawberries that had so many different flavor profiles. When they come into season in your area, ask the farmers what they’re growing and do a taste test to see which ones you like best.

It’s difficult for any fresh berries to make it home, but when they do, we don’t refrigerate them. We eat them or process them within 24 hours to capture all of that tangy — and eagerly anticipated — flavor.

Back-Burner Strawberry Sauce Recipe

  • Published on Jun 1, 2011
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