Fresh Strawberries

This time of year, paying a visit to a Pick Your Own (PYO) Strawberry Farm can be a lot of fun for all the family. Just look at this character greeting us on arrival this week at our local PYO – how could one resist?

The previous occasion when I visited a PYO Farm was Christmas Eve. We were in Victoria State, Australia, and had decided to make fresh strawberries the pudding course in the dinner for 9 that we were hosting on Christmas Day. Strawberries for Christmas? It sounds a bit weird to we northern hemisphere types. Even more so when the PYO Farm’s festive musical accompaniment to the strawberry picking includes Shakin’ Stevens belting out Snow is falling, All around us… (What? There was a bright blue sky and it was 30C).

Just to put any concerns at rest, let me make clear that this post will not conclude with me adding Shaky to the ADK Playlist. Phew!

This week’s trip was to Pickwell Farm in Southampton. The coastal area stretching east from the city’s outskirts towards the village of Hamble has been a soft fruit growing area for decades.

As my photos below show, the strawberry plants are plentiful, and the fruit ripe and rich in colour.

Here is the haul from our visit – a kilo and a half of fresh strawberries.

The kilo has been made into jam, by boiling the fruit in water with preserving sugar. The half has been made into fresh ice cream – I used the recipe I posted last summer which you can check out here. Alternatively, you could make Eton Rifles Mess!

Do you have a Pick Your Own Farm near you? If so, why not check it out. With the fruit still on the stalks, you can be assured of optimum freshness, and be your own boss of quality control. You will be doing your bit to support local businesses and reducing food miles. What’s more, the prices should be much less than you’ll pay in the supermarket (hey, there must be some trade-off for providing all that manual labour!) Best of all, it is a really fun activity.

I toyed with adding Strawberry Fields Forever to the ADK Playlist with this post. However, good though the Beatles are, they aren’t really my era, so I’m going instead for a fave Scottish band, Franz Ferdinand. This is Fresh Strawberries.