SFist In the Kitchen: Strawberries
You don't need us to tell you what to do with strawberries. Eat them raw on a picnic and enjoy their juicy flesh. Eat them in the raw with your lover, dunking the red fruit in chocolate and pursing your lips suggestively to take a bite. Strawberries encourage sensuality, and some consider them aphrodisiacs. Maybe it's because they appear in the late spring, when the weather changes and the hope for a bountiful year lightens everyone's steps despite the high pollen counts weighing down the air. Maybe it's because they stain the lips an inviting red. Maybe it's just because the taste and heady fragrance overwhelm our passions.
Photos by Melissa Schneider
The domestic breeds on display now, descendants of a Frenchman's cross between two American varieties, scream of ripeness. They're ready to be eaten; we're happy to oblige.
Strawberries want to be eaten raw or just barely cooked, though we never turn up our nose at a strawberry-rhubarb pie or strawberry preserves. The plump red pendants can be plopped into a fruit salad or sliced atop gingerbread or sweet biscuits. Top the latter with fresh whipped cream to make a strawberry shortcake that will wean you from the Twinkie-like shortcakes you find in the grocery store. For an elegant treat, drizzle authentic balsamic vinegar over whole strawberries.
If slicing them is too hard, throw them in a blender with light rum, sugar, and lime juice to make strawberry daiquiris, or with frozen yogurt and a banana to make smoothies. And what better way to end a warm day than with a super-fresh strawberry sorbet you put into the freezer that morning to be ready for you when you get home?
Warm summer days beg for simple preparations, but a recent dinner at Seattle's Lampreia inspired us to stuff strawberries with a white chocolate mousse and then set them gently on pools of strawberry syrup and a mint-infused crème anglaise. We got fancy with a pastry bag and a star tip, but you can spoon the mousse into the strawberry for a more casual version.This dish has delicate flavors, and we'd suggest a delicate wine to go alongside, perhaps a Sauternes from France or a sweet German auslese riesling.