Y'all need to try Belgian strawberries, they never disappoint. The only time I had that bland experience was when buying cheaper, redder ones, from Spain I think.
Why do strawberries seldom live up to their promise?
31–40 of 47 posts
Re: Why do strawberries seldom live up to their promise?
#32This is true for almost all modern fruit and vegetables. The varieties you can buy in most supermarkets have been selected for yield, hardiness in the field, and ability to be transported. Unless the farmer is niche, flavor doesn't even come into play as a factor. Add to that fact that transportation now includes going halfway across the world because consumers want the fruit available all year long, and that makes t…
Not true at all. Bananas are such an incredible counterexample, so ubiquitous that we barely even think about them. In my mind, they are clearly the best fruit. I have never had a banana that looks better than it tastes. Bright yellow bananas will always taste good. This is because the Cavendish is a clone, which leads to their vulnerability to pests but the point still stands. Another great counterexample is grapes.…
> Apples are all fairly horrible except the Cosmic Crisp. The rest are bland and disappointing.
You must have had some bad apples (pun intended).
Any apple that's a hybrid of a Royal Gala and something else is guaranteed to at least be crisp and somewhat sweet.
Royal Gala is crisp, a little less sweet and acidic, and has a fairly watery taste (not necessarily a bad thing—imagine drinking off a cold, fast-flowing creek).
Pink Lady is very crisp, sweeter, and more acidic.
Envy apples are top-tier apples. Crisp, sweet, similarly watery to Royal Gala, and are usually immense. For me a single apple can stave off both lunch and dinner, it's superb. Although they are fairly expensive.
Fuji apples are equally large but considerably less sweet, though still crisp and watery.
Re: Why do strawberries seldom live up to their promise?
#33Given the writer lives in Britain she would do well to forget about farmed berries and forage for wild blackberries instead. Urban, suburban, rural, they're everywhere. They're bang in season at the moment and my wife and I are getting half a kilo (a pound) in about 40 mins of lazy picking in the mornings before work. They are absolutely delicious and freeze well for cakes, crumbles and such in the winter.
We have wild black raspberries all over. Enough that I was just wondering a few hours ago if it would be less effort to spray some with herbicide than take them out with the brushcutter. Anyway, they are delicious, but we've had ridiculous amounts of rain this summer. All the rain seems to have made them flower and grow earlier than usual and die off much faster. Normally there's fruit for about a solid month. I thin…
> spray some with herbicide than take them out with the brushcutter
Brings back a funny memory. First day of school in Oregon, teacher asks a bunch of kids what they did for vacation. One boy says his dad paid him to take out blackberries. A new girl, from Texas, spoke up: "Why on earth would you kill a berry bush?"
A real, "you're not from around here are ya?" moment. In western Oregon, blackberries are so pervasive and grow so fast, you have to fight then off to save your property!
Re: Why do strawberries seldom live up to their promise?
#34Here in Norway our locally produced strawberries are always a big deal, as they taste orders of magnitude better than imported ones.
Stalls pop up all over selling them direct from farms, and the first ones of the season usually go for $10+ for a ~500g/1lbs basket.
Part of it is the short time from they're picked and till they're in the stores/stalls for sale. Another is the specific breed of strawberries, there's a large variety between the various ones. But our weather plays a large role[1], up north with our long sunny days and cool nights combining to make the berries grow slower and taste more.
To me they most certainly live up to their promise, and enjoy them a lot each season.
[1]: https://www.nytnorge.no/artikler/en-guide-til-norske-jordbae...
Re: Why do strawberries seldom live up to their promise?
#35This is true for almost all modern fruit and vegetables. The varieties you can buy in most supermarkets have been selected for yield, hardiness in the field, and ability to be transported. Unless the farmer is niche, flavor doesn't even come into play as a factor. Add to that fact that transportation now includes going halfway across the world because consumers want the fruit available all year long, and that makes t…
> because consumers want the fruit available all year long, and that makes things even more complicated I'd be interested to see an independent study of household preferences on this. I suspect most people in my circle would prefer tasty, nutritious, local, and seasonal over the current situation.
> I suspect most people in my circle would prefer tasty, nutritious, local, and seasonal over the current situation.
If we did that at any meaningful scale our whole food system would have to change. I'd welcome it personally, but at least in the US our system is a fragile house of cards and I don't think people would be prepared for what may change or break along the way.
Re: Why do strawberries seldom live up to their promise?
#36Get a local farm CSA. Your berries will be bangin. Mine right now are tart and sweet and red. They’re smaller than you get in the store and ten times better.
Our local CSA always uses their strawberry crop to signal the start of their summer season. The weather has been tough this year and some of their crops have struggled, but the strawberries we did get were still excellent compared to what you get in a grocery store.
Re: Why do strawberries seldom live up to their promise?
#37Everything is so financialized that most people will die not knowing what a strawberry tastes like. That's dystopian.
Usually we think private equity sucks the life out of a company, leaving an empty husk. It doesnt end there. They sucked profits out of the flavor of strawberries.
In 30 years the owning class will own everybody's bodily organs, mark my words.
Re: Why do strawberries seldom live up to their promise?
#38Here in Norway our locally produced strawberries are always a big deal, as they taste orders of magnitude better than imported ones. Stalls pop up all over selling them direct from farms, and the first ones of the season usually go for $10+ for a ~500g/1lbs basket. Part of it is the short time from they're picked and till they're in the stores/stalls for sale. Another is the specific breed of strawberries, there's a…
> an exposé in which a promising-looking specimen is cut in half and revealed to be watery-white inside
Yeah no. At least here, the flavor is in the colored bits. The white bits are mostly just water indeed. The best ones here have a deeply saturated red color almost entirely throughout.
And you don't want them too large, preferably around half an inch in diameter. I joke that all strawberries being born with the same amount of flavor, it just gets spread out as they grow.
Re: Why do strawberries seldom live up to their promise?
#39This is true for almost all modern fruit and vegetables. The varieties you can buy in most supermarkets have been selected for yield, hardiness in the field, and ability to be transported. Unless the farmer is niche, flavor doesn't even come into play as a factor. Add to that fact that transportation now includes going halfway across the world because consumers want the fruit available all year long, and that makes t…
Not true at all. Bananas are such an incredible counterexample, so ubiquitous that we barely even think about them. In my mind, they are clearly the best fruit. I have never had a banana that looks better than it tastes. Bright yellow bananas will always taste good. This is because the Cavendish is a clone, which leads to their vulnerability to pests but the point still stands. Another great counterexample is grapes.…
> Bright yellow bananas will always taste good.
Not to me. I love bananas, but I don't think they start tasting good until they've started to freckle.
> feel bad for people who are stuck with cantaloupe
Don't feel bad for me! I love cantaloupe even more than bananas.
Re: Why do strawberries seldom live up to their promise?
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not true at all. Bananas are such an incredible counterexample, so ubiquitous that we barely even think about them. In my mind, they are clearly the best fruit. I have never had a banana that looks better than it tastes. Bright yellow bananas will always taste good. This is because the Cavendish is a clone, which leads to their vulnerability to pests but the point still stands. Another great counterexample is grapes.…
> Apples are all fairly horrible except the Cosmic Crisp. The rest are bland and disappointing. You must have had some bad apples (pun intended). Any apple that's a hybrid of a Royal Gala and something else is guaranteed to at least be crisp and somewhat sweet. Royal Gala is crisp, a little less sweet and acidic, and has a fairly watery taste (not necessarily a bad thing—imagine drinking off a cold, fast-flowing cree…
I’ve had far too manager mushy gala apples to want them again. When they’re greats they’re great. When they’re bad, they’re terrible