Here They Go A-Berrying

The kids and Mama are off strawberry picking this morning, taking advantage of Mama's work starting later today and also the cool morning. It's the end of the season, but I'm sure they'll find some berries. Now, whether they actually come home with any is another story!

I don't think we'll do anything sophisticated with the berries. No pie, no jam (since we still have jam from last year, that we'll have to toss soon). Just berries, maybe some cream for me . . . it is Wimbledon time, after all.

The Strawberry Miracle

There is the pot of dirt that has been sitting next to our garage for a year. It was our strawberry plant that died an early death, too hot and unwatered last year as we tended to our hanging tomato plant (we never managed to put the strawberry in a hanger). Anyway, it never really blossomed, much less produced fruit, but we saved the dirt and container for . . . who knows what--planting dirt this year? mud to play in? or even just quit noticing it?

Well, I noticed it yesterday on my first outside walk in two months. And it had leaves. And strawberries! Yes, strawberries! Three: one bright red one, two still-ripening pink ones. I called the kids, on their way to school, and they were so excited. When they got home, Bud picked the single red strawberry, a tiny specimen of summer, and shared it around. It was gorgeous, but the most sour berry I've ever had. No matter, it was lovely and summer-y and shared among us all.

All from a plant we thought was gone.

The Strawberry Crawl

Conditions were perfect: the farm report said tons of big, ripe, juicy berries; the weather was the most bearable it would be in days; the fields were dry; it was a school day for almost everyone else but our whole family was together.

So we went strawberry picking.

For a year, Sis has said she'd only eat strawberries that she herself picked and then only right off the bush. Well, yesterday, she ate her weight in big juicy berries and still managed to contribute to our 15 lbs of strawberries.

They really were the most gorgeous berries I've ever picked or eaten, warmed by the midday sun. I would gently lift the huge, almost heart-shaped leaves to reveal bright red surprises, with dozens more pink and green berries ripening for our next visit. And the berries were so ready, broke right off the bush, with a bit of stem, just like they're supposed to. So I crawled on juice-stained red hands and knees (we always wear pants to go fruit picking) along three rows of berries, filling our big baskets. The kids carried their little pints, filling and then emptying their contents, occasionally bringing me or Mama a choice berry, all with similarly red-stained fingers. I couldn't help humming Sarah McLachlan's version of "Ordinary Miracles" to myself.

"It's not that usual

When everything is beautiful

It's just another ordinary miracle today

"The sky knows when its time to snow

You don't need to teach a seed to grow

It's just another ordinary miracle today

"Life is like a gift they say

Wrapped up for you everyday

Open up and find a way

To give some of your own."

Of course, the strawberries are almost gone, just two days later: we ate them plain, with cream, with pancakes, with cereal, dipped in chocolate; I made 6 pints of freezer jam and an adaptation of our favorite Fresh Strawberry Pie. There are just enough left to either make another batch of jam or to freeze to eat later in the year, but I don't think they'll keep much longer unprocessed somehow.

And so we'll go back, with our playgroup friends, or maybe even with Mama depending on how long the season lasts. But I'm not sure anything could match the perfection of yesterday's miracle.

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My Own New Fresh Strawberry Pie

1 1/4 cups graham crackers, crushed

1/3 cup butter, melted

1/4 cup sugar

1-1/2 quarts fresh strawberries
1 cup sugar
3 tablespoons cornstarch
2 tablespoons lemon juice
16 oz sour cream

Make graham cracker crust but combining melted butter and sugar, then stir into crushed graham cracker crumbs until they stay together when pressed. Press into lightly greased pie plate, bake at 375 for 4-5 minutes. Cool. (BH&G recipe)

Cap strawberries; reserve half of the best ones. Mash the other half and add sugar and cornstarch which have been mixed together. Cook 5 or 6 minutes until clear and thick. Stir in lemon juice. Cool. (This takes longer than you expect and is the hardest part).

- Add whole strawberries to the cooled mixture, save some for garnish. Pour into baked pie shell. Top with sour cream and garnish with fresh whole strawberries, if desired.

Mommy Hungry

A Day in the Life

I was thinking a lot about ancestors yesterday, or even just the past, as my kids and I partook of a New England summer ritual: berry picking. For about an hour we happily but haphazardly picked berries, eating a lot as we went, gathering about 13 lbs of ripe and almost ripe fruit from about 2 rows of bushes. Then we took the berries home (fast forwarding a lot through the now-famous fall at the park and subsequent trip to the ER) and spent the remainder of the afternoon processing them. First, placing them all in the fridge in shallow trays and then pulling out batches for jam and pie. It takes awhile to wash and hull 4 quarts of berries. And then do it again with 1 1/2 quarts. All the while boiling sugar or baking pie crusts or washing jars and lids.

And then I had a moment of clarity about how busy and exhausting harvest time must have been long ago. (I probably shouldn't limit it to long-ago ancestors. I have cousins--hi Cousin S--who are farmers and whose lives very much revolve around the weather and the harvest, whose work is round-the-clock exhausting or worrying when crops come in or weather threatens. Sure, they have equipment that farmers didn't have 100 years ago, but that doesn't mean it's easy. Even so, I'm not sure it's the same--I hope it's not--as people living at the beginning of the century before last; starvation doesn't quite threaten in the same immediate way.) Because my ancestors, all of our ancestors (more on that eventually because I just read a fascinating article about how if you go back so many generations, all of our ancestors are exactly the same ones!) didn't go berry picking for fun or just for an hour one day during the season. And it couldn't be haphazard with them eating so much along the way--this would be the majority of their food for the off season. Then, they didn't have just 13 lbs to deal with, nor a refrigerator, stovetop, oven, and the like to help them with the work. Or the security and comfort of knowing that if it didn't work, there was the store or other food. It wasn't entertainment, a teachable moment. Even after a few hours, we were losing enthusiasm for prepping berries and making jam and pie. And they didn't do it just once but for several days. Or else. Plus all the other things too. Because, no doubt, they weren't just busy with berries but with squashes and lettuce and cucumbers and then the crops of the next season and later the prepping and the planting and . . . and . . . and . . .

All said and done, our pie and 4 pints of jam are delicious and will be a wonderful reminder of a great day (as soon as we can forget the fall part. Oh, and if you want more information on the contemporary canning movement, see here.). But I'm glad it's just that--a fun summer afternoon experience and not the difference between survival and starvation.

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Fresh Strawberry Pie

1-1/2 quarts fresh strawberries
1 cup sugar
3 tablespoons cornstarch
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 nine-inch baked pastry shell

- Cap strawberries; reserve half of the best ones. Mash the other half and add sugar and cornstarch which have been mixed together. Cook 5 or 6 minutes until clear and thick. Stir in lemon juice. Cool.
- Add whole strawberries to the cooled mixture, save some for garnish. Pour into baked pie shell. Top with whipped cream and garnish with fresh whole strawberries (though, we like it even better with a dollop of sour cream!)

strawberry pamphlet

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Strawberry Freezer Jam

4 lbs strawberries, rinsed and hulled and crushed (or 3-12 oz bags unsweetened frozen, thawed in fridge until soft enough to crush)

1 1/2 cups sugar

plastic or glass freezer jars

1 packet of Ball No Cook Freezer Jam Pectin

Stir sugar and pectin together in a bowl until well mixed.

Add 4 cups crushed fruit. Stir 3 minutes.

Ladle jam into clean jars to fill line. Twist on lids. Let stand until thickened, about 30 minutes.

Freeze for up to 1 year. Thaw in fridge and enjoy up to 3 weeks.

Makes 5 half-pint jars.

Ball Freezer Jam pectin

Strawberry Girl (and Boy)*

One berry
Two berry
Pick me a [strawberry]
Hatberry
Shoeberry
In my canoeberry
Under the bridge
And over the dam
Looking for berries
Berries for jam. (Bruce Degen, Jamberry)

We picked strawberries today in the hot summer sun. The kiddos were so excited to have their own little boxes to carry and excitedly ran to the tractor stop. Picking fruit and riding on a tractor pull, what fun! And Mama, oh my! She joined us briefly, mainly because she has to work late tonight and wanted to come.

You could smell the strawberries as we approached the distant field filled with moms and children. They say our modern strawberries are bastard imitations of the very fragrant heirloom varieties--I would love to smell a field of old strawberries if these were the less impressive kind!

And so there we were, running up and down our assigned row looking for strawberries like Easter eggs. I was kneeling in the straw cover looking for the red juicy ones, but Mama and the kids had more luck--and that was the half I saw since I know Bud and Sis ate at least half! We did two rows and finished with about 7 lbs of berries uneaten. They ate more in the car, so I am not sure exactly how many I just washed and put in the fridge for safe-keeping.

We had talked about strawberry pie and strawberry shortcake, and I had thoughts of strawberry freezer jam and strawberry sorbert, on the way home, but they decided they just want them "plain."

But, I think I can freeze or use half and they won't even notice.

**Anybody else read Lois Lenski's book? I don't remember it much except that I loved the illustrations in my copy and liked the story.

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Goo’s Redwall Strawberry Cordial
2 lbs. strawberries
1 cup granulated sugar
½ cup powdered sugar
¾ liter of plain seltzer
2 tablespoons water
1 pint heavy cream

Wash and slice strawberries. Heat strawberries on low flame in saucepan with ½ cup sugar and 2 tablespoons of water. When soft and rendering liquid, add the other ½ cup of sugar. Strain strawberries over bowl, saving juice. Crush strawberries until only seeds and fibers left. Add to juice. Cool juice. Add seltzer to strawberry juice to taste. Add cream to cordial to taste and texture. Sweeten with powdered sugar. Refrigerate at least an hour or until chilled. Serve with fresh whipped cream.


Strawberry Sorbet

2 cups water
1 cup sugar
1 quart strawberries, hulled
1 ½ teaspoon lemon juice

In heavy saucepan boil water and sugar for 5 minutes; do not stir. Add strawberries; cook 5 minutes more. Stir in lemon juice. Cool. Puree. Refrigerate until chilled. Pour into ice cream maker and freeze for approximately 25 minutes.