It’s STRAWBERRY TIME!
I don’t know about you, but we’ve been eating strawberries pretty much every day for the past two weeks. Our appetite for strawberries largely exceeds what our singly strawberry bed can supply but luckily our neighbours have a strawberry field in their backyard and every day they put up little buckets for sale in front of their door. Since the strawberries appear at different times every day, the whole family is tasked with keeping an eye on their little stand. We’re not the only people in the street that like strawberries, you see, so it’s a bit of a race!
So far we’ve mostly been eating strawberries with yogurt and granola for breakfast with the occasional smoothie thrown in for variation, but today I want to make jam and a strawberry tart too. If you have an abundance of strawberries and are looking for creative ways to use them, I’ve got you covered:
Strawberry galette – this galette is both rustic and elegant enough for a dinner party: flaky buttery dough with jammy caramelised strawberries served with basil cream.
Strawberry cinnamon rolls – because the taste of garden strawberries is not very concentrated and they have a high water content, I roast them before rolling them into this tender enriched yeasted dough. I also made these rolls ‘triple cinnamon’, adding cinnamon at every step: in the dough, to the strawberries when roasting them and to the filling too. What can I say – I like cinnamon.
Strawberry & gooseberry galette – the flavours of the two fruits complement each other superbly: the strawberries mellowing the tartness of the gooseberries and the gooseberries supplying an edge for a fruit that by itself can be a little cloying when cooked. The ground almonds in the pastry dough trap all the lovely fruit juices while preventing the pastry from turning soggy.
Spinach salad – the irony taste of spinach combines well with strawberries marinated in balsamic vinegar which accentuates the taste of the strawberries that is then offset by the sharpness of the goat cheese. I often add seeds or nuts to salads both for their nutritional value and the crunch, and the pumpkin seeds are good here in terms of flavor and in keep with the color scheme.
Roasted strawberry cake – this cake is a child’s play to make! If you use cup measurements it is especially simple – the child in question would only need to know how to count to three. There is no butter to cream, so it’s just an easy stirring job. The cake has a perfect texture – light and airy and punctured with pockets of roasted strawberries fruit.
Strawberry basil ice cream – This ice cream is not only very good (“fantastically good” according to my son), but also extremely easy to make. There is no making custard , you just puree the ingredients together and freeze them – that’s it. Unlike in many other recipes, strawberries really are the main ingredient here – not yolks or cream, which means it is considerably lighter, fruitier and generally fresher tasting.
Strawberry elderflower jam– a soft set jam with distinct pieces of strawberries perfumed with elderflowers
Strawberry smoothie – the perfect light breakfast for early summer
Strawberry dumplings – strawberries are also one of the best fruit for filling these yeasted dumplings!
As always, I’d love to know what your favourite strawberry recipes are!
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