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And — one of the best things about a Japanese strawberry is finding it in the middle of a azuki bean paste mochi snack!

But, sadly, it is true about strawberries–if there was a competitive ‘good’ strawberry, then bad Californian SB’s would be selected against. In season, local berries outsell ‘Merican ones hugely but our season is June….

It is a metaphor for life, since we are seduced by the avalibility of out-of-season produce AND the smell. What I don’t understand is how you can breed for smell and not flavor—isn’t the smell FROM the taste?? Obviously not since the smell is over and the taste is under whelming.

Grrrrr–I will eat only Freedom Strawberries!!

I liked the ramps stories–do you also buy and eat (and will you tell us a story about) fiddleheads?

This is the aspect of North American produce (I thought it was just an Ontario phenomenon) that I really loathe. But they really have us over a barrel. We can buy unripe strawberries or no strawberries. Here in Toronto, it is a rare occasion that one can get storebought strawberries that actually taste like strawberries. Even with local strawberries.

It’s the same thing with peaches, tomatoes, apricots, etc. etc. I think the producers are so nervous about bruising that they pick when the fruit is at its hardest. A couple of late summers ago, I was in the Niagara area DURING peach season. I stopped at a roadside stand to get peaches that had been picked that day. All of them were hard and green. The lady at the stand looked at me as if I was completely off my rocker when I asked her why they had picked them before they were ripe.

The ONLY time we have ever gotten fantastic peaches was one Septemer when we bought some slightly bruised windfall peaches from one of those Niagara stands. They were being swarmed by wasps and I seem to recall that we paid $1.00 for a large basket. Those peaches made the best pie… a peach pie to measure all other peach pies.

-Elizabeth

Judith–I only ate fiddleheads for the first time in New Hampshire last spring, so I don’t have much experience with them. They are not common around here, at least, that I have noticed–but they are all over the woods in New England. And they are wonderful, very like little spirally asparagus spears.

Look for another story featuring a local wild food soon, though!

Most of the farmers around here, Elizabeth, pick at peak ripeness. It is only the grocery store fruit that is crunchy to the point of inedibility. I think that there is still a very rural/farm mindset in Ohio–we are still a heavily agricultural state–that people -know- what farm-fresh produce should taste like so they don’t demand the plastic stuff at the farmer’s market or farmstand.

Thank Gaia for that–else, I would likely starve to death!