I really just don't know.
The alarm on my phone gently woke me up this morning and Max was right there. "Hurry up and get dressed! We have to go and pick our strawberries!" My thought at that moment was: Crap! I would really love to sleep for just another hour. I did get up, even if it was not with the intended enthusiasm, and I got ready to go. Did I mention that it was 6:30 in the morning? Anyway, we got on the road and were one of the first cars at the farm. It was the perfect day to bend over for a couple of hours and pick (eat) fresh strawberries. The sun was shining and it was not too hot and muggy. Max was so excited that he just kind of ran all over the place picking a berry here and a berry there. Oh yea, and he ate his weight in about 25 minutes. "Max, I am telling you, if you keep eating those you are gonna be sorry! You have to pace yourself." I suppose that trying to tell a 5 year old to pace himself is like telling Niagara to reduce its flow, really just a waste of breath. After almost 2 hours, we had picked 6 quarts of berries. That is a heck of a lot of picking!
We had 3 of these baskets heaped with berries. Don't they look yummy?!
Next was figuring out what to do with some of the millions of these tasty little morsels, so we decided to first make jam. OK, now the de-greening of all of those tiny little berries was not the most fun I have ever had but it was for a good cause and I only did one of those giant baskets to start. Next was the washing, smashing, sugaring, waiting and then boiling. I am not sure that I really like making jam but the end product is so good I am convincing myself that it is worth it.
One giant basket of berries made 2 -quart jars of super succulent jam. I don't like big hunks of berries so I did a bit of a puree after it was cooked. After it had cooled a bit Max tried it and... Hated it! "How can you not like this? This is the best jam on earth!" "Hate it." was all he said as he walked away in disgust. I was flabbergasted that he would act like such a flibberdeegibet, and after all that work we put into this.....OK, I am not going to let this slide. Later on I made him his favorite sandwich, in miniature form, and took it to him to try. Guess what? He loved it!
At the end of the day Max and I had racked up quite a few hours of hard physical labor, fun, running, handing out berries hither and yon, and lots of cooking to make the jam. After I put Max to bed, he fell asleep almost before I left the room, I went down stairs and ate another one of those berries. They really are perfect and the work we did to get them makes them not just perfect, it makes them ours and that is why we love them best.I thought that you might like to see what a 5 year old can look like at the end of an adventurous day like we had. He didn't want me to take his picture but I asked real nice like and he whined a bit, but when I said that it would be on the blog...he went a little over board. Notice how technicolored he is? Boy, did he have a great day.
Please always remember and don't ever forget:
"One must ask children and birds how cherries and strawberries taste."
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Strawberry Jam Recipe Printable Recipe
1.5 - 2 Cups of sugar
1 lemon, zest and juice
2 pints of fresh strawberries
If your strawberries are very sweet, you can go lighter on the sugar, otherwise combine the lemon juice, zest and sugar in a sauce pan on low heat until the sugar is completely dissolved. This takes about 10 minutes, then add the cleaned strawberries and cook them down till they let some of their juice go and it comes to a light boil. Took my batch about 20-25 minutes before the liquid in the pan got thick enough to kind of gel on a cold plate. Next, you can put it in jars and into the fridge or do the whole canning thing on the jars.
1 comment:
I must have strawberries now. But only if Max stands in front of me and makes faces.
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