Strawberry SEASON
It’s strawberry season in the Hudson Valley and our vendors are loaded with the fresh red fruits we all enjoy and look forward to. Here are 10 things about strawberries you might not have known:
The average strawberry has 200 seeds.
A strawberry flower averages five to seven petals
Technically berries have seeds on the inside and they don’t come from a single ovary, so strawberries are really in a group all their own.
Strawberries are the first fruit to ripen in the spring.
The majority of the roots are located in the top 3 inches of soil.
94% of American households consume strawberries.
According to the USDA, Americans eat 3.4 lbs. of fresh strawberries a year.
Americans also eat another 1.8 lbs. of frozen strawberries a year.
One acre of land can grow about 50,000 pounds of strawberries.
Strawberries are grown in every single U.S. state and Canadian province
Before we had the ability to ship food all over the world, many of the fruits we now can get year-round we only available during a short time frame from local growers. I’m old enough to remember those times and as a kid, I used to eagerly wait for the strawberries to ripen so we could enjoy them. Strawberry shortcake, strawberry pie, strawberries on ice cream, and my all-time favorite as a kid was a bowl of strawberries with cream. Now I enjoy them in my morning cereal, sometimes in a smoothie, and often I just grab a handful to snack on. After the season had passed, we would have to get our satisfaction from the jams and jellies my grandmother would make. While they were delicious in their own right, they never really could replace the flavor and taste of fresh-picked strawberries. If you haven’t grabbed a box yet from a local grower, I strongly encourage you to pick some up this weekend at the market! Be sure to indulge as the local strawberry season is closing and soon, we will have to wait once again for next season’s crop.
Greg
Millbrook Farmers Market Manager