Fresh Strawberries Galore!

Yesterday I went strawberry picking for the first time ever. In my mind, I wanted to get around 20-25 pounds of strawberries. I ended up with 1 flat full and it was only about 13.5 pounds. Crawling on a row of straw, with a baby on my back was tiring and 1 flat was plenty. I figured I could always go back! We had a blast with our friends too!

 Unfortunately, my legs were extremely itchy and burned a bit from crawling on the straw. Maybe I’m allergic. Who knows?! So, what do you do with all of those strawberries you ask? First thing’s first, strawberry applesauce. You who have read my posts before, know that I make my own applesauce for Leilani. So I figured strawberry applesauce would be delicious! I cored/cut up 8 medium sized Gala apples after washing them, keeping the skins on, and threw them in my trusty crock pot. Then I cleaned up a big bunch of strawberries and layered them on top of the apples and added 1/4 cup of water. The strawberries have enough water in them that you don’t have to add much water. We learned that the hard way – sorry Jen! – but thanks for being the guinea pig! Here’s what it looked like.

Then, after talking with Jen again, I decided to mix them up a little so the juice from the strawberries would help the apples not stick. I threw them on high and let them sit all day. My house still smells delicious!! I purchased the Infantino squeeze station this week and decided that I would squeeze this batch into pouches for Leilani so we can take them camping! The squeeze station was a bit tedious, but overall a great product and I’m really excited for what else we can make! Here is what it looked like.

Next on the list, strawberry muffins. Here is the recipe we used that was found on Facebook. They turned out tasting really good, but a little bit dry in my opinion. I’m not sure how to make them more…moist. Yep, just used the word moist. Deal with it.

That’s all for today. Tomorrow will be more strawberry stuff. I want to do a strawberry puree with a rough chop of strawberries and freeze into ice cubes to make strawberry lemonade and then possibly some jam. For sure I will be freezing some for later use in smoothies, yum. I’m sure I’ll be sick of strawberries by the time I can see the bottom of the cardboard crate.

Until then!

~ Lee Ann