The King of Summer

The strawberry: the ultimate summer fruit. You just have to eat it at the right moment, make sure it’s at the right temperature and it has to be the best variety. So, everything you want to know about strawberries. 

The plant

The strawberry plant belongs to the rose family. Strawberries are also known as summer kings. They are the only fruit with seeds on the outside. Strictly speaking, a strawberry is therefore not a fruit but a so-called false fruit (the seeds on the outside are the actual fruits).

Growing and harvesting

Strawberries grow best when it isn’t too warm, with a maximum temperature of 22 degrees. Because the fruit is delicate, it has to be picked by hand. If you harvest it mechanically, the fruit is quickly bruised, and bruised varieties rot faster.

Season

The season roughly runs from mid-May to September. From October to May, many strawberries are also grown, but then in greenhouses. The strawberries you buy in season are sweeter, juicier and therefore tastier, if you ask us. They’re also much cheaper.

Nutritional value

A strawberry is packed with fibre, vitamin C and folate (vitamin B11). All good for you.

Top three strawberry varieties

1. Lambada. A big name in the strawberry world. And for good reason: this variety is large and very sweet (provided it’s properly ripe, of course). It ripens relatively early; the Lambada can be harvested in May.

2. Korona. The fruit of this plant is soft and luscious. The flavour is intense, an explosion in your mouth. Delicious in your Corona.

3. Mara des bois. Small strawberries, deep red in colour. They are fresh and tart and smell of woodland fruits. The fruit is quite soft, so you have to handle it very carefully.

Whichever variety you buy, if you want to wash the strawberries, wash them very carefully and leave the stems on – otherwise the fruit will absorb water and lose its flavour. Also make sure they are at the right temperature; if they have just come out of the fridge, strawberries are too cold. The flavour will be lost.

How do you recognise quality?

The size and colour of a strawberry say little about its quality. Of course, a half-green strawberry isn’t ripe yet and therefore isn’t tasty. But a ripe strawberry can always be good quality – whether it’s small or large, light red, purplish or deep red. Actually, there’s only one golden rule: buy them in season. That’s when they taste best.

Storage

It’s best to store strawberries in a cool place if you’re not going to eat them straight away. They’ll keep for about three days in the fridge. Take them out of the container and place them next to each other on an uncovered plate; this will prevent the kings from bruising or going mouldy.

You can also freeze strawberries. Arrange them in the same way on a flat plate and carefully slide the plate into the freezer. Once the strawberries are frozen, you can store them in a bag in the freezer (it saves space). This way, they’ll keep for at least eight months. They will lose some flavour, though; we would use them after thawing for smoothies or to make jam – if you want to eat them on their own, just buy fresh ones.

Never remove the tops from a strawberry until just before you put it in your mouth. Without their tops, the summer kings quickly lose a lot of moisture and flavour.

Tip for the true fan

: go to Het Aardbeienland in Horst aan de Maas, an amusement park dedicated to strawberries, with a pick-your-own field and a strawberry museum.