(False) Strawberry Fields Forever.

This is our first cycle of seasons in our new house and I was super excited to see strawberry plants popping up all over our yard this spring. I was well prepared for our explosion of strawberries. I pinned all sorts of recipes on Pinterest. I bought freezer bags. I read up on the best way to freeze berries (spread on a cookie sheet, freeze overnight then put in freezer bags. That way you avoid clumping.)

And then.

Well then out popped a little red berry on one of my oh-so-happy happy strawberry plants. It was red, but didn’t quite look like a strawberry.  I broke it open and it looked like foam inside.

WHAT IS THAT?

Turns out our happy strawberry plants are actually known  as a “false strawberry.” Seriously.

I would like to know the mindset of the person who plants a false strawberry plant.

I just can’t imagine thinking:

You know what we should put here? A strawberry plant. No, that would be too much yumminess. Let’s plant a false strawberry. That would be perfect. It would fool people into thinking happiness is coming. AND THEN. BAM. DISAPPOINTMENT.

Well, color me disappointed.

So I dragged my kids (and some friends and their kids) out to Finnell Farms last week to pick our own strawberries. We did the same thing last year as you can see here.

This year Nolan and Lily (and their mommies) came picking with us.

Lily

Nolan

 The kids were so much more helpful than last year in picking. Zoe even got into it for a few minutes, though she still wouldn’t eat one. Sigh.

Max, such a cute little field hand, was also a stellar help:

We brought home four quarts. So far we’ve made a dinner of spring strawberry salad with chicken which was super good. We also made strawberry ice cream with my new Cuisinart ice cream maker (which really is great, by the way. Buy one. It’s on sale for $40 right now through Amazon, which seems like a good deal.)

 Last night we made strawberry balsamic pizza, with chicken, sweet onion and applewood bacon. I found it on this blog through Pinterest. Man, was it good. And pretty. And yes. We ate THE WHOLE THING.

Tonight I’m thinking strawberry shortcake and tomorrow I’d like to make strawberry salsa to put over a balsamic chicken of some sort. Still thinking about that one.

And then it’ll be time to start looking into false strawberry recipes. I’d like some false strawberry jam. And some false strawberry daiquiris. Because that sounds like fun. Seriously. WHO PLANTS FALSE STRAWBERRY PLANTS?

Geez.