Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Fresas

The real deal. I took my whole family and my dog 3000 miles round trip for these babies. Sure we saw the grand canyon, hoover dam, zion national park, my grandma, nephew, and aunts, sure we spent two days at our favorite beach campground in santa barbara eating awesome mexican food, sure we did lots of stuff, but what we were really doing was driving halfway across the country so I could buy the tastiest strawberries ever to make jam to last all year. We have strawberries here, and in season they taste good, but nothing, I mean nothing compares to an oxnard strawberry picked fresh that day. These strawberries don't make it to the market. If you see strawberries that say oxnard on them, they aren't the same, they were picked green. I have always bought mine at a farm stand that has been in the same place since I was a little girl. We would stop there on the way to my grandpa's boat to stock up on veggies and fruit for our weekend sails. The stand is smaller now and there are a lot of newer stands that are easier to get to, but this one will always be my go to. In fact we get excited when we have to wait for the truck to come with the strawberries just picked from the field because they are sold out. When we lived in cali we would probably go through 5-6 flats in the two short months of strawberry season. This time I had to settle on one and half flats since we were traveling with a camper and had no way to freeze them. The kids probably ate half a flat, and the rest is in my cupboard to be rationed in one a month increments. 


a sink full of heaven

I remove the top and cut in half to store them fresh in the fridge

if it ain't red thru and thru send it back

the various containers of berries 'pre-cooked' with sugar and lemon,
the only way they would keep on the long journey home

blend em' up

simmer down for a bit and add pectin

fill your hot jars

I love my claw, this is how I get them out of the boiling water

jars of heaven, I put two straight in the fridge,
no need to can what will be eaten right away


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