National Strawberry Day!

Today is National Strawberry Day!

You can do so many things with strawberries.  I make berry fools (pic above) when combining them with raspberries.  I reduce them in a sauce pan until they are almost completely liquified and add them to a variety of things, especially whipped cream (with a few other ingredients in small quantities) to make an amazing strawberry cream.  Sometimes I even roast them (yes, roast them) and use them to make a strawberry cream cheese ice cream.  Sometimes I even pair them with mozzarella, making a strawberry syrup that I pour over fresh mozzarella with sliced berries, or adding both to a salad.  

I love putting strawberries in things because I often find the strawberry by itself to be a bit more tart than I would like.  I'm not sure if that's simply because they were picked too early, or maybe the plants didn't get enough water, or for some other reason.  Maybe the berry itself is simply stronger than I would like.  So I usually take strawberries and put them in other things. 

But when I combine them with raspberries, I find that any possible tartness in the strawberry is completely mitigated.  I think it's a perfect combination.  

So I think I will head out to the grocery store today and pick up a few quarts of berries and celebrate the day with a few experiments.  It's a warm late winter day here, windy and bright, and it seems a perfect day to do a little experimenting.