The strawberries are here. Don’t wait.
The Jersey strawberry season lasts about three weeks.
Three weeks. Maybe four if the weather cooperates and the farmers get lucky. Then they’re gone until next June and you’re left eating the pale, hard, flavorless things from the grocery store that smell like cardboard and taste like a memory of a strawberry rather than an actual one.
I say this not to make you anxious. I say it because I want you to go to the farm stand this week. This week, not next week, not when you get around to it. This week. Before they’re gone.
I have been going to Jersey farm stands my whole life.
I know the particular happiness of pulling into the gravel parking lot on a Saturday morning when the stand has just opened and everything is arranged and abundant and the air smells like something growing. I know the way you walk past the flowers and the herbs and the early lettuces and then you see them — dark red, small, fragrant in a way that stops you mid-stride.
Jersey strawberries don’t look like grocery store strawberries. They’re smaller. More irregular. Sometimes almost purple-red rather than the bright candy-red you find in a plastic clamshell in February. They’re soft in a way that tells you they were picked recently and handled gently and didn’t travel a thousand miles in a refrigerated truck.
And the smell. The smell is the whole thing.
If you hold a Jersey strawberry up and it smells like summer — sweet and slightly floral and intensely of itself — buy everything they have. If it doesn’t have a scent, put it down and find a different stand.
Your nose will not lie to you about a strawberry.
Here is what I do every June when the strawberries arrive.
I buy more than I think I need. Always. Because I have learned, over many years and many June mornings, that there is no such thing as too many Jersey strawberries. There is only not enough.
I eat some of them in the car on the way home. This is not a character flaw. This is correct behavior.
The rest I bring into the kitchen and I figure out what they want to be.
Sometimes they don’t want to be anything except themselves — sliced, maybe with a little sugar if they need it, eaten over the sink at noon because it’s June and the kitchen is warm and there’s nowhere to be.
Sometimes they want to be shortcake. Not sponge cake — I want to be very clear about this — real shortcake, which is a biscuit. A proper, buttery, slightly crumbly biscuit split in half while still warm, with macerated strawberries spooned over and barely sweetened whipped cream that collapses a little as it hits the warm biscuit. That is the dessert. That is the right answer.
Sometimes they want to be jam. A small batch, no pectin, nothing complicated. Just strawberries and sugar and lemon juice cooked down until it thickens and smells like June and goes into jars that will make February feel less bleak.
And sometimes — not always, but sometimes — they want to be left almost entirely alone. Macerated with a little sugar and a splash of good balsamic vinegar, left for an hour until they’ve made their own syrup, then spooned over vanilla ice cream or panna cotta or just eaten straight from the bowl with a spoon.
That last one requires no recipe. It requires only a willingness to leave something alone and let it become what it wants to be.
There is a particular kind of sadness that comes in late June when you go to the farm stand and the strawberries are gone.
You know it’s coming. You’ve known it since the first week. That’s part of what makes them so good — the knowledge that they won’t last, that you have to pay attention now, that the window is short and the world doesn’t wait.
I think about this every June. About the things that are only here for a moment and what it costs to miss them because you were too busy or too distracted or you figured you’d get to it next week.
The strawberries don’t wait for next week.
Neither, if I’m being honest, do most of the things that matter.
Go this week. Buy too many. Eat some in the car.
Make the shortcake at least once. Make the jam if you have an afternoon. Macerate a bowl with balsamic and put it over ice cream on a Tuesday night because Tuesday is special enough.
And when they’re gone — and they will be gone, sooner than you think — you’ll already be looking forward to next June.
That’s the right relationship to have with a Jersey strawberry.
If you want to keep the strawberry celebration going, I put all of my favorite seasonal berry recipes into a beautiful new Strawberry Cookbook. You can find a copy right here in my shop!
STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE With real biscuits, because that’s what shortcake is
Serves 6 · 40 minutes · Worth every minute
For the biscuits: 2 cups all-purpose flour 2 tbsp sugar 1 tbsp baking powder ½ tsp salt 6 tbsp cold butter, cubed ¾ cup cold heavy cream, plus more for brushing 1 tsp vanilla extract
For the strawberries: 2 lbs fresh Jersey strawberries, hulled and sliced 3 tbsp sugar — start here, adjust for sweetness 1 tsp fresh lemon juice Pinch of salt
For the cream: 1 cup heavy cream, very cold 2 tbsp powdered sugar 1 tsp vanilla extract
Make the strawberries first. Toss sliced strawberries with sugar, lemon juice, and a pinch of salt. Let sit at room temperature for at least 30 minutes. They’ll release their juice and make their own syrup. Taste and adjust sugar — Jersey strawberries often need less than you think.
Make the biscuits. Preheat oven to 425°F. Whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Cut in cold butter with your fingers until you have rough, shaggy crumbs with some pea-sized pieces — this is what makes the biscuit flaky, so don’t overwork it. Add heavy cream and vanilla and stir with a fork just until the dough comes together.
Turn out onto a floured surface. Pat gently — don’t roll — into a rectangle about ¾ inch thick. Cut into 6 rounds or squares. Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Brush tops with heavy cream. Bake 14-16 minutes until deeply golden.
Make the whipped cream. Beat cold heavy cream with powdered sugar and vanilla until it holds soft peaks. Stop before it gets stiff — you want it to be billowy and slightly loose.
Assemble while the biscuits are still warm. Split each biscuit. Spoon strawberries and their syrup generously over the bottom half. Add a large spoonful of whipped cream. Place the top half of the biscuit on at a slight angle so it looks abundant and imperfect.
Serve immediately. The biscuit will begin to absorb the strawberry syrup and the cream will settle and in ten minutes it will be something different and slightly less beautiful but still completely delicious.
Eat it while it’s right.
Nonna’s notes:
The biscuit is the whole argument for making this yourself rather than buying sponge cake from the store. The biscuit is buttery and slightly salty and it makes the strawberries taste more like strawberries. Don’t skip it.
If your strawberries are very sweet, cut the sugar to 2 tablespoons and let them sit longer. If they need a little help, use the full 3 tablespoons and add an extra squeeze of lemon.
The cream should be barely sweetened. This is not whipped cream from a can. This is cream that knows it’s not the star of the dish.
Leftover biscuits? Toast them the next morning and eat with butter and jam. You’re welcome.
— The Jersey Nonna
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